


Forced

by 427-67Impala (australis86)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Art, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Explicit Language, Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt Sam Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Protective Dean Winchester, Torture, Wincest - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-10
Updated: 2012-12-10
Packaged: 2017-11-20 19:39:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 32,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/588937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/australis86/pseuds/427-67Impala
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John Winchester has never been Father of the Year - especially to Sam, who he blames for Mary's death. He finally crosses the line and comes unhinged when he finds out his boys are sleeping together, and poor Sam cops the full force of his rage, forcing Dean to take his baby brother and hit the road to save both their hides.<br/>The damage is already done, though, and Sammy has some pretty serious wounds - mental and physical. He's just starting to get himself together in the safe haven of Sioux Falls when John tracks them down, determined to finish what he started, and Dean is forced to do something drastic to protect his baby brother.<br/>(No spoilery warning details here, beyond that it was written for a hardcore Big Bang. I can tell you it's complete, though...)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> _Word count:_ 32,441  
>  _Setting:_ Pre-series (Teen!chesters)
> 
> Written for the 2012 [SPN Hardcore Big Bang](http://spn-hardcore-bb.livejournal.com/) on LiveJournal. Accompanying art was drawn by the awesome and talented [reapertownusa](http://reapertownusa.livejournal.com/), and you can see it embedded in the fic [at my LJ](http://meganlouise86.livejournal.com/8161.html). (And you should. It's amazing!)
> 
> Yes, I know, I know: John Winchester would never do this stuff. But that's the beauty of fanfiction - in this fic, he does! I love John, but I had this scenario in my head and I had to write it (I clearly watch too much _SVU_ , and too much _Criminal Minds_ ). But, like Sam said: "A little more tequila, a little less demon-hunting…"
> 
> It makes me so happy to be able to tick ALL the Archive Warnings. :)

_Norfolk, Nebra_ _ska  
_ _28 January 1997_

The house was empty when Sam got home from school. He shut the squeaky front door on the flurries of snow falling outside, shrugged out of his damp jacket and hurried into the living room to get a fire started in the fireplace.

Yes, 'fireplace'. The house the Winchesters were currently occupying was old - like, pre-WWI old - and it only had fireplaces and radiators for heat. While some people might say it had 'charm' or 'character', as far as Sam was concerned the place was kind of a dump. It had already been abandoned for a year or two before John had moved them in a few months previous, when he'd started using it as a kind of home base for this current hunt, and although they'd jerry-rigged power and turned on the water it wasn't exactly the Waldorf Astoria.

There weren't trees growing through the floorboards or anything, but it  _was_  still an abandoned house. The garden was overgrown to the point where it should really be called a 'jungle', and the building itself was clad in weatherboards that had once been a bright white, but the paint was yellowed and peeling. Much like a lot of the paint on the inside, actually.

The inside was just as run-down as the outside, full of furniture that was older than John (and even more worn and scarred), but there must have been a time when it was beautiful. There were high ceilings with plaster roses around the antique light fixtures, ornate moulded cornices, and worn, creaky floorboards that were now dull with dirt. It might  _still_  have been nice, except for the water damage and graffiti on the walls.

The Winchesters were only staying in this dusty slice of vintage middle America because John had spent the last few lunar cycles tracking a series of werewolf attacks throughout eastern Nebraska and into west Iowa. Werewolves were not something Sam was old enough to take on just yet, so he and Dean were sitting this one out, and it was cheaper for them to squat in an abandoned house than for John to spring for motel rooms in two cities.

Sam and Dean really didn't mind that their father was gone for days - sometimes weeks - at a time. Sam was occupying himself with 8th grade, and Dean didn't even care that he was working a 'real' job at a local garage instead of hunting. Because if John wasn't home, that meant he couldn't lay a finger on them.

Papa Winchester was an angry guy a lot of the time, and he liked to take that anger out on his sons. He would go off on whichever one was closest, but he preferred that to be Sam - it was no secret that John blamed him for Mary's death, and he would yell and scream at his youngest son after he'd had a bad day or a few drinks. And sometimes even when he hadn't.

When it got physical, as it almost inevitably did, Dean would get in the middle and try to take the worst of it. He did his best to protect Sam, but both Winchester boys always breathed a sigh of relief whenever John found a hunt and hit the road. It was just  _easier_  when they were alone.

Sam was relaxing in front of the newly-kindled fire, reading a book by the light of a lamp when he heard the throaty rumble of Dean's beaten-up old Triumph motorcycle in the driveway. His face broke into a smile, and he jumped up to open the door. By the time he got to it and worked the lock Dean was standing on the other side.

"Dad home yet?" Dean asked immediately, stepping inside out of the snowy Nebraska dusk. He hadn't seen the Impala, but it was better to be safe than sorry so he asked the question anyway.

"Nope. When he called earlier he was still in Iowa. Won't be back till tomorrow morning," Sam replied, smiling wider.

"Good. 'Cause I've been thinking about you all day." Dean grinned, and kicked the door shut behind him before he leaned down a little and kissed Sam on the mouth.

There was another reason the Winchester boys were enjoying their time alone: they had been sleeping together for about six months, and hiding something like that from their father was a lot easier when he was on the road. He had plenty of reasons to hit them already, and the thought of what would happen if John found out… well, actually, they tried really hard  _not_ to think about that.

Dean shrugged out of his leather jacket and hung it on a coat hook by the door to dry off, then checked his watch. "I'll be home earlier tomorrow, okay? Should be back by about 6," he promised, and Sam nodded. They were both well aware that their father was unlikely to be in a good mood after the long drive back from Iowa, and these werewolves seemed to really be getting under his skin, so Dean didn't want to leave Sam alone with him any longer than he had to.

Dean went through into the dimly-lit living room and stood in front of the fire, holding his palms out to the flames and rubbing his hands together to get the circulation going. He'd found the 30-year-old Triumph Bonneville in the garage when they'd first 'moved in', and it beat the hell out of walking while John was away with the Impala, but it was just  _not_  what you wanted to drive through a mid-west winter.

"The library closes at five tomorrow, but I'll hang out at there as long as I can," Sam said, coming to stand next to him. Dean immediately gathered his baby brother into a hug that smelled like leather and sweat and engine oil. Sam smiled, taking a deep breath and savouring that familiar  _Dean_  smell.

"Don't worry about me. I'll be fine for an hour."

"I know." Dean wound his arms around Sam's midsection, hugging his back tight against his chest. Sam let him, and Dean took a second to enjoy the way his little brother's body moulded itself to his. He didn't understand how John could hurt the kid - Dean would sooner die than leave a mark on him. Well, unless Sam asked him to.

"Forget about him. Let's make the most of tonight." He kissed the soft skin of Sam's neck, just where it met his left shoulder. He moaned a little as Dean ran his tongue up along the carotid artery, then pressed those soft, full lips to the pulse just below his jaw.

"Mmmm. You smell good." Dean purred, running his hands along Sam's shoulders and sliding his flannel shirt off.

"I haven't had a shower yet." Sam breathed, letting his head fall to the side and giving Dean better access.

"Good. Don't." Dean kissed him again, fighting the urge to nip the soft, smooth skin. He wanted to mark Sam, to leave some kind of sign that he was  _his_. But John would ask what had happened, and where his thirteen-year-old son had got what was quite obviously a hickey. And that unnecessary attention was exactly the kind of thing they wanted to avoid.

So, Dean checked himself with a little growl and made do with a kiss. Even though he still very nearly sucked a bruise into Sam's neck before he could tear himself away, the younger Winchester groaned in disappointment. He enjoyed it when Dean bit him.

"Can't risk it," Dean breathed, his lips just touching Sam's cheek as he spoke.

"Don't care," Sam whined, "I like it."

Dean growled again, then pulled Sam's t-shirt up over his head and tossed it onto the couch. Those marshmallow lips found their way back to that pulse under his jaw, drawing a pretty little keening noise from the back of his throat, but this time Dean laid a trail of soft kisses all the way down to Sam's left shoulder. He stopped at the end of the trapezius muscle and bit down - not so hard he drew blood, but enough that when he released his grip there were two arcs of teeth marks in Sam's pale skin. He'd have a faint bruise for a few days, and that was just the way Sam liked it.

He exhaled slowly, leaning back into his big brother, and Dean smiled wolfishly and did it again. He bit a little harder, leaving more teeth marks just to the right of the first. Sam groaned and arched his back a little, grinding his body maddeningly against Dean's.

Dean paused for a second to pull his own shirt off and sighed when he felt Sam's shoulders pressing against his bare chest. His back was still warm from the fire, and Dean wrapped his arms around Sam again and pulled him back tight against his bare torso, enjoying the lingering heat in his skin. Sam clasped his hands over Dean's and a strangled little moan fell from his lips when Dean bit him again, leaving two more red crescents on the left deltoid as he undid Sam's jeans.

Sam turned around in the embrace and kissed Dean on the lips, reaching down between them to undo his big brother's jeans. He ran his hands down Dean's toned chest and stomach, over the ghosts of old bruises on his ribs from John's last drinking binge the week before, then hooked two fingers under the waistband of his boxers and slid them down. Dean was already mostly hard when Sam sank to his knees in front of him.

Sam felt one hand rest gently on the back of his head as he leaned forward and wrapped his lips around his big brother's cock, looking up at him from under his lashes with those big hazel eyes. He saw Dean's smiling lips part slightly as he sucked in a long, slow breath.

Dean exhaled slowly and let his head loll back, running a hand through that golden-brown, floppy hair, resisting the urge to push Sam forward and force himself deeper into the wet heat of his mouth. He let Sam do his thing, rubbing that hand gently up and down the back of his neck, then down over the back of his shoulders before he let it rest on the smooth, pale skin at the base of Sam's neck.

Sam might be young, but he was a fast learner, and _talented_ : with just a little effort, he could reduce his big brother's vocabulary to his name and a series of small moans. Dean was usually happy for him to do it, too, but this wasn't what he wanted tonight. This was… well, honestly, Sam gave the best blowjobs Dean had ever had. But, amazing as they were, that wasn't what he'd been thinking about all day.

He didn't really want to, but after only a couple of minutes he buried his hand in Sam's soft, silky hair and pulled back gently. Sam resisted for a second but then sat back onto his heels, looking up at Dean questioningly.

"Sorry, sunshine - you're too good at that." Dean sighed regretfully, and grasped him by the shoulders and pulled him to his feet. "I love your lips, but…" He trailed off as Sam stood up on his tiptoes to give him a kiss.

He reached around and grabbed Sam's ass with both hands, through the black cotton of his boxers, squeezing tight and lifting him up higher. He loved Sam's lips, but he liked his backside even better -  _that_  was what he'd been thinking about all day.

Sam smiled when he felt Dean's hands on him, and he wrapped his legs around his big brother's waist. Dean responded by turning around and pushing Sam's back against the wall, pressing his chest and hips against him to keep him there. His baby brother's hard-on was trapped between them, pressed against his stomach, and he could feel the heat even through the cotton boxers.

He let Sam down off the wall and he tugged on Dean's hand, trying to pull him to the floor in front of the hearth, but the older Winchester resisted.

"Aw, you wanna do it  _here_?" he groaned, obviously not thrilled with that plan.

"Sex in front of a roaring fire on a snowy night doesn't do it for you…?" Sam asked breathlessly, quirking an eyebrow.

"I've been under a car all day, and the floor is as hard as a rock," Dean complained, and grabbed his hand to lead him into the bedroom. Sam groaned but he followed anyway, his bare feet slapping the cold floorboards as he skipped to keep up with his big brother.

"You really have a lot to learn about romance, Dean." He tried to sound put out as he wriggled out of his boxers, but when Dean pulled him down onto the bed there was a smile on his face.

"Want me to bring you roses and candy next time?" he asked, and rested his hands on his little brother's quads as Sam straddled his thighs.

"Would it kill you?" Sam gave him a pointed look and leaned over to retrieve a condom and the tube of lube from the nightstand. The only light in the room was what spilled in from the hallway through the slightly open door, but Dean could see that little smile was still on his puffy, well-kissed lips - he was just teasing.

"You're lucky you're so adorable. Makes it hard to put you over my knee and spank you for crap like that." Dean watched him tear the condom open, unconsciously licking his lips as his little brother rolled it on for him.

"I might like that." Sam waggled his eyebrows suggestively, but couldn't hold back a surprised yelp when Dean abruptly smacked him on the ass.

"If you're not careful, you're gonna find out," he threatened, grinning. Sam couldn't help but laugh at that, and leaned forward to give him a quick kiss. Dean gave him a gentle shove in the shoulder, trying to reverse their positions, but he held on and stayed right where he was. Dean looked up at him with eyebrows raised, silently asking the question:  _What do you think you're doing?_

When they first started a physical relationship, Dean had fully intended to be the one driving the bus. He'd had years of practice in bed, after all (even if it  _had_  been with girls), and Sam was a virgin. But it soon became apparent that even though Dean was usually the one on top, he wasn't the one in control. That fact wasn't lost on the youngest Winchester, and he smiled as he squeezed some KY into his palm and stroked his hand up and down Dean's length a couple of times. If Sam wanted to be on top there was no way he was going to say no and they both knew it. So Dean rested his hands on those slim hips and just  _let_ him.

He kept his eyes on his little brother's face when he felt Sam get into position, watching as he started to press down. Dean liked this part. He liked the way Sam's head tilted back slightly as his eyes fluttered closed, and the way his lips parted just a little when Dean slid inside. It hurt him a little at first, and Dean could always see the tension in his features for a few seconds at the very beginning.

He stroked softly at Sam's left hip with his thumb, just watching a little smile lift the corners of the younger Winchester's mouth as he relaxed. He was off in his own little world, savouring the moment, just like his big brother. Dean wondered sometimes if he should let this…  _unorthodox_  relationship of theirs continue, but that satisfied little smile always chased the doubts away. Nothing that made Sam feel that good could be wrong.

And the way the kid's body pressed around him like this, velvety soft and hot and intoxicatingly tight… well, that didn't hurt either...

Dean was snapped out of his daydream when Sam leaned over and kissed him. He rested his hands on Dean's pecs while he pressed his lips against the older Winchester's, deliberately rolling his hips as he did. Sam was flexible in ways Dean's other sexual partners just  _weren't_ , and he felt his little brother's lips curl up into a smile when he sucked in a quick, involuntary breath.

"Ohhh, Sammy, you're too young to be so good at that." Dean groaned, squeezing his eyes shut.

"Practice makes perfect," Sam whispered back. "Plus, I had a good teacher."

He kept moving his hips just like that, slowly and rhythmically, enjoying the way it made Dean moan. The older Winchester moved with him, instinctively, rolling his hips up to meet Sam's. He had just caught his big brother's bottom lip between his teeth when Dean grabbed him around the ribs with those big, strong hands and suddenly reversed their positions.

This time Sam wasn't quick enough to counter it and he was on his back almost before he realised what was happening. Both Winchester boys let out disappointed groans as Dean slipped out, but the older brother took that opportunity to flip Sam over onto his stomach and pin him down with a hand between the shoulder blades before he pushed straight back into that tight, slippery heat.

Sam groaned, grabbing handfuls of the bedspread and burying his face in the pillow. Dean leaned forward, resting his elbows either side of Sam's body as he cuddled up close and kissed the back of his neck. His hair was long enough to cover it, so Dean nipped a little too.

The younger Winchester wasn't the only one with skills - Dean knew things about Sam's body that the kid hadn't even dreamed of, and could play him like a fiddle. For instance, there was a spot just below Sam's right ear that drove him mad and Dean was nibbling at it mercilessly, enjoying the way Sam moaned and keened beneath him.

They were too focused on each other to hear the Impala pull into the driveway a full 12 hours early, or the old floorboards creaking outside their room as John looked through the slightly open door.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

The next day, Dean was still at work when Sam got home from the library just after 5pm. He hung his jacket up in the entryway before he walked into the living room, books in hand and backpack slung over one shoulder, and found John sitting on the couch by the crackling fire with a newspaper open on his lap. With a half-finished bottle of scotch on the coffee table, right beside an empty tumbler.

"Hey, Dad." Sam greeted him, and tried not to let his smile falter. He'd seen the Impala in the driveway, so had time to prepare the façade.

He kept his eyes away from the scotch and hurried past his dad into the kitchen, where he snagged a couple of pieces of fruit. If he could just get his snack and make his escape into the relative safety of his bedroom…

"Anything interesting happen while I was gone?" John called, from the living room. His voice sounded even, but it still made Sam jump.

"No, just the usual," he replied, doing his best to sound casual.

"You boys need to learn to clean up after yourselves. Found a pile of dirty laundry on the couch when I got home."

Sam winced. Usually they were more careful than that. "Saw the Impala in the driveway this morning, but I didn't hear you come in last night."  _God, if he knew how those clothes got there...!_

"It was dark. You boys were in bed," John said, still sounding unusually calm. Generally, he had a hair trigger after half a bottle of scotch… maybe he'd finally eradicated the werewolves, and that was why he was in such a good mood.

Sam glanced at his watch and grimaced. Still an hour before Dean would be home. There was still plenty of time for their dad to make a dent in what was left of the bottle.

"So how did the hunt go?" Sam continued, trying to change the subject before John decided he needed to teach his youngest son the importance of keeping the place neat and tidy.

This time there was a pause before John answered, and when he finally spoke he wasn't in the living room anymore. He was standing in the doorway of the kitchen, not three feet from Sam.

"Oh, I found out all sorts of new stuff," John growled, and grabbed a handful of Sam's hair from behind before he could even  _try_  to run. John dragged him back into the living room almost before he knew what was happening, and punched him in the face hard enough to knock him into the wall next to the fireplace.

"Dad-" Sam spluttered, but hardly got the word out before he was cut off by another punch, this time to the stomach. He was already gasping for breath when John put a hand around his throat and squeezed, lifting him nearly completely off the floor.

"I always knew there was something wrong in you," John snarled, his face only centimetres from Sam's. He could smell the scotch on his father's breath as he kicked out at him, scratching desperately at the hands clamped around his throat while his mouth filled with blood from his split lip.

"Everything goes bad around you. You got your mother killed when you were a baby, and now…" John trailed off, grimacing like he'd just taken a mouthful of spoiled milk.

Orange dots were starting to dance in Sam's vision as he stared into John's hard, bloodshot eyes, wondering how a seemingly civilised conversation had gone off the rails like this. He'd gone from zero to psycho in seconds, and Sam didn't even have any idea what had set him off.

John suddenly released his grip on Sam's throat, and he stumbled as he tried to keep his feet under him. Before he could get his balance, John backhanded him hard enough to open up a cut over his right cheekbone and send him stumbling through the doorway and out into the entrance hall, where he lost his footing and crashed hard onto the cold floorboards.

As he lay there, dazed and gasping for breath, John kicked him hard in the side then grabbed the hem of his shirt and ripped it up and off over his head. Then, with Sam staring up at him in oxygen-deprived confusion, John undid his son's own belt and yanked it free of his jeans, drawing shrieks of protest from the belt loops as they tore.

"Christ. You don't even know what I'm talking about, do you?" He heaved a sigh, glaring down at Sam as he ominously wound the buckle end of the belt around his hand a couple of times. "That's funny, Sam, because I would've thought taking your brother's cock up your ass was a memorable experience."

 _Oh God._ Sam's heart nearly stopped then, and looked up at his father with wide, frightened eyes as it finally dawned on him just how much trouble he was in.

"That's right. I saw you, you slut." John's mouth twisted up into a hard little smile, and he swung the belt down hard on the left side of Sam's chest.

He barely had time to register the  _whoosh_  of the leather strap through the air before it hit his skin, immediately raising a one and a half inch wide welt across his ribs. The blow took his breath away and he couldn't even scream - he curled up into a ball around his injured ribs, with a strangled gasp of pain.

"I don't know how you made him do it, or why," John grunted and swung the belt again, this time catching Sam across the left shoulder. There was the sharp  _snap_  of leather striking skin, and this time he let out a cry of pain - that blow had been harder, drawing blood. When John kicked him in the ribs again, throwing him over onto his back, the wound left scarlet smears on the entryway floor.

"But it stops,  _now_. I'm going to make sure it never fucking happens again." John whipped Sam across the chest again. And over and over again after that. When Sam would curl up, he'd hit him across the back and shoulders. When he tried to crawl away, John kicked him some more - in the ribs, in the kidneys, and even a couple of glancing blows to the head. He kicked hard, too, putting his entire body into each shot.

Sam was only semi-conscious when John grabbed him by the hair again and dragged him out of the entryway and into the front bedroom. He didn't even realise they were moving until John pulled him roughly to his feet and tossed him face first onto the big old bed. The ancient box springs squealed in protest as he landed hard, limp as a rag doll, and John shut the bedroom door behind them. Sam heard a  _click_  as he turned the lock.

He groaned, trying to turn over onto his back and get the pressure off his injured ribs. He was bruised and bleeding from more than a dozen different lacerations all over his body, at least a few of which were on his face - he could see the blood on the floral bedspread when he opened his eyes. It stood out amongst the green leaves and the yellow petals of the roses.

"Tell you what, Sammy - since you like cock so much, I'm gonna give you some."

Sam froze, wide eyes staring at the bedspread. Surely he hadn't heard that right. Those words hadn't just come out of his father's mouth.

Without his belt it was easy for John to pull his youngest son's jeans off. They were on the floor almost before Sam could muster a scream for help, but the house was so far back from the street and the neighbourhood so empty that he knew with a cold, stomach-twisting certainty that it didn't matter. No-one was going to hear him anyway.

Sam had no choice but to stop screaming when John put a knee between his shoulder blades and knelt on him. He couldn't breathe, and he had to let John pull his underwear off too. The crushing pressure on his back didn't let up until John had gagged him with his own boxer shorts, shoving them so far into his mouth that Sam nearly choked.

"Shut up. Nobody's coming to save you, you little whore." John viciously twisted one arm up behind his back, bringing fresh tears to Sam's eyes. He struggled to suck in enough oxygen through his bloody nose, and the musty scent of the long-stored bed linen filled his nostrils.

Through the heartbeat thudding in his ears and his fast, ragged breathing, Sam heard the sound of a zipper being undone. He knew what was coming next and he bucked hard, almost on instinct, desperately trying one last time to get loose. But he just wasn't strong enough, and John responded by twisting his arm further up between his shoulder blades, pressing him down harder onto the bed.

Sam cried out and arched his back, trying to take some of the pressure off his wrist, but John twisted it further still. There was a sudden explosion of hot pain in his wrist and he screamed again, but the sound was so muffled by the gag that even someone just outside the door might not have heard it.

Red dots appeared in the darkness behind Sam's closed eyelids as he struggled to breathe through the pain, but he got the message loud and clear. He forced himself to stop struggling, and after what seemed like an eternity John finally released some of the pressure on his arm.

Sam relaxed a little and tried to take a deep breath, but the gag got in the way and his bruised ribs protested viciously. He felt John leaning over him and did his best to stay as still as he possibly could, even though his skin was crawling and every fibre of his being wanted to fight like hell to get away.

"You deserve this," John whispered, his lips just centimetres from Sam's ear. He didn't sound angry so much as he sounded… pleased. Like he was  _enjoying_  this.

Even as he turned away, squeezing his eyes shut and biting down on the gag, Sam listened desperately for the sound of a motorbike in the driveway, or the front door opening on its squeaky hinges, or even the phone ringing - anything. But all he heard was John spitting into his palm, and his stomach twisted; obviously, that was all the lube he was going to get.

A hand clamped down like a vice on the back of Sam's neck, pushing his face into the bedspread, and a knee roughly pried his legs apart. He didn't get a chance to adjust or to stretch out - John just pushed down hard on his back and forced his way inside, as deep as he could go, and Sam couldn't even get enough air into his lungs to scream.


	2. Chapter 2

Everything was quiet when Dean opened the front door just after six. The fire crackled in the living room and the shower was running in the master bedroom's ensuite bathroom, but other than that, there were no signs of life.

He hung up his jacket and went through into the living room, wincing when he saw the half-finished bottle of scotch on the coffee table. He cut through the kitchen, absently putting a couple of pieces of stray fruit back in the basket on the bench, then almost tripped over Sam's backpack when he turned the corner into the hallway.

That made Dean stop and think for a second. He paused and looked back at the backpack, unconsciously biting his bottom lip.

Sam wouldn't leave his bag there, right in the middle of the walkway. He invariably took it with him into his bedroom, where he'd hide out from John behind a stack of homework until his big brother got home. This was especially true when their dad had a load on.

So why was Sam's backpack in the middle of the floor? And for that matter, why were there two pieces of fruit sitting randomly on the kitchen counter, like they'd just been dropped there and forgotten?

Every instinct Dean had told him something wasn't right. He looked around, listening, but didn't see or hear anything else out of the ordinary. Even the shower had stopped. The house was as quiet as a grave.

"Sam?" Dean called, his voice low. He stepped over the backpack into the hallway, and heard a noise from his own bedroom. Just a small one, muffled by the closed door.

Dean made a beeline for the last door in the hall and tried the handle, but stopped when he heard the noise again - a small, strangled whimper. It almost sounded like someone was crying.

"Sam? You in there?" Dean called through the door, still trying to keep his voice down.

"Dean?" A very small, very shaky voice came back to him.

"It's me, Sammy," Dean said, a sick feeling starting in the pit of his stomach. He closed his eyes and leaned his forehead against the cool wood of the bedroom door, then took a deep breath.

"I'm gonna come in, okay?" he asked, and there was another whimper in reply. He took that as a 'yes', and had the door open in a heartbeat - the room was almost dark, so the first thing he did was turn the light on, and what he saw literally took his breath away.

Sam was curled up in the corner of his big brother's bed where it met the wall, hugging a pillow close to his chest, and he was  _covered_  in fresh cuts and bruises. Dean knew without having to ask that his father was responsible, and the poor kid looked like John had used him as a punching bag.

Dean shut the door behind him and immediately went over to his little brother, his heart racing in his chest. It was even worse when he got closer - Sam looked like he'd gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson. He had a black eye, a split lip and a few other small cuts, but the blood had somehow gotten smeared all over his face. The tears falling from his eyes ran through it, turning them scarlet before they dropped onto the pillow.

"Sammy, what the hell happened?!" Dean reached out to touch his shoulder, but Sam whimpered and shied away. He pulled his knees up closer to his chest, curling up as tight as his badly bruised ribs would allow, and that was when Dean noticed he was completely naked. And that there were twin rivulets of drying blood running down the inside of his little brother's thighs.

His brain took a second to think it through, but there was really only one explanation for that, and just the _thought_  of it made Dean feel sick.

"He knows, doesn't he?" Dean breathed, but Sam didn't - couldn't - answer. He just let out a choked little sob, burying his face in the pillow. He was shivering and his breathing was shallow and rapid, on the edge of hyperventilation, so Dean grabbed the folded-up blanket from the foot of the bed and threw it over him - he didn't know what the hell else to do. Sam pulled the blanket tight around him, hugging the bloody, tear-stained pillow close to his chest.

"Tell me, baby. What happened?" Dean asked gently, sitting as close as he dared and fighting the urge to scoop him up into a bear hug. There was nothing he wanted more than to pull Sam in tight against his chest and tell him he was safe now, and he was going to be okay, but he'd seen enough TV to know that was the  _last_  thing Sam wanted. So they sat in silence for a minute until Sam found his voice, and even then it was so soft and hoarse that Dean had to lean in closer to hear him.

"He… he attacked me as soon as I got home from school," Sam whispered, fresh tears welling up in his eyes. "Said there was something evil in me. He choked me, kicked me, hit me with his belt…" He paused again, taking a couple of long breaths. "He threw me onto his bed, and… and…"

His whisper-quiet voice broke then, and he reached out tentatively with his left hand. Dean moved closer and after a moment's hesitation Sam struggled into a sitting position and leaned against him, letting Dean put an arm around him and resting his head on his big brother's shoulder.

"His… it wasn't bigger than yours, but it hurt 'cause he was rough and there wasn't any lube, and he wouldn't stop and he gagged me so I couldn't scream…"

Sam only just managed to get the words out before he buried his head in Dean's neck and just sobbed, holding on like his life depended on it. Dean couldn't blame him, given what had just happened - it was going to take  _him_  a little while wrap his mind around this, and he couldn't begin to imagine what it must be like for Sam.

"It's okay, sunshine. You're safe now," Dean whispered, numbly. He couldn't think of anything else to say, so he brushed the hair out of Sam's face with one shaking hand and just held him for a minute until he got his breathing under control and stopped crying so hard.

"Wanna take a shower," Sam rasped, still cuddled up tight against his big brother. Dean's body heat had warmed him up a little, so at least he wasn't shivering anymore.

Dean nodded, taking a deep breath and steeling himself a little - he understood what Sam wanted to wash away. He was covered in dried blood, which was bad enough in itself, but blood wasn't the only thing that had run down between his legs. Sam could _feel_  it, all half-dried and sticky, and all he wanted to do just then was wash it the hell off.

Dean helped Sam limp next door to the main bathroom on his obviously swollen left ankle, and waited outside the door while he had a short shower. He went through the motions pretty much on muscle memory, doing just enough to rinse away the blood and that stickiness between his thighs, wincing as the water stung his many open wounds.

He still didn't feel clean when he got out, but that wasn't something a shower could fix. There were clean sweatpants and a hoodie waiting for him, and as he got dressed he didn't even notice the hoodie was Dean's and that it was about two sizes too big.

Sam let Dean sit him back on the bed, draping the blanket around his shoulders to try and keep him warm and stop him going into shock. Well, any  _further_  into shock - that ship had sailed, really. Dean had noticed that tell-tale glassy, far-away look in his little brother's eyes and was just trying to keep him comfortable until they could hit the road. He was taking Sam out of this nightmare - now,  _tonight_  - but there was one last thing he needed to do before they went.

"Stay right here, okay?" Dean kissed Sam on the forehead then went over to the duffel bag by the foot of the bed. He dug into it a little and pulled out his new stainless steel Colt semi-automatic - a gift from John for his 18th birthday a few days earlier - and there was a series of metallic clicks as he ejected the clip, checked it, and slid it home again with the heel of his hand.

Sam blinked a couple of times at the sound and finally focused on Dean, and when he saw what his big brother was doing his eyes widened to approximately the size of dinner plates. 

"Dean…" Sam said uncertainly, flinching as he worked the slide to chamber a round. You didn't have to be a mind reader to know where this was going.

Dean's expression was hard when he looked up from the gun. "Don't worry, Sammy, I'm just going to do something I should have done a long time ago. He's not going to hurt you again." His façade faltered for a second as he looked at Sam's bruised and bloody face, but only for a second. Then he just turned and walked calmly out the door and down the dimly-lit hallway, the big handgun heavy in his slightly sweaty right hand. He was so intent on his task that he didn't hear Sam limping along behind him, as fast as he could manage.

As far as Dean was concerned, he didn't have another choice - John was escalating. He was going to keep hurting Sam. Dean hated to think where he was going to escalate  _to_  after the elevator doors closed on the floor designated 'beat and rape your youngest son'… but someone had to make sure he never got the chance. Sam might not make it out next time.

Dean paused briefly when he got to the entryway, looking down at the bloodstains on the floor at his feet - he hadn't noticed on his way in, but for the life of him he didn't know how he could've missed them. The angry, raw belt wounds on Sam's back and shoulders had bled a lot, and there was so much blood smeared on the hardwood floor it looked like someone had dragged a side of beef through the hallway.

He could see a couple of Sam's small handprints on the pastel green wallpaper, too, where the kid had tried to haul himself to his feet to get away. That was when John had kicked his legs out from under him, severely spraining that left ankle and making absolutely sure he couldn't run or fight. Dean was going to make him pay for that.

Dean felt Sam grabbing at his left hand as he walked up to John's bedroom door, pleading with him not to do this, but his voice sounded soft and very far away. There was only one thought going through Dean's head: John wasn't going to get the chance to lay a finger on the kid ever again. One way or another, he was going to end it.

He drew in a deep breath, took a second to get his game face on, and then kicked the door right beside the lock with a grunt of effort. There was the shriek of splintering wood, and the door flew open hard enough to embed the handle in the plasterboard of the bedroom wall.

John was just sitting on the end of the bed, doing up his shoes like everything was normal. Like he hadn't just raped his youngest son and beat him to within an inch of his life.

There was an empty hip flask on the dresser, right by his handgun and the small arsenal of blades and other assorted weaponry he usually kept hidden on him, which meant he was unarmed when he stood to face Dean. Not that he cared, or even really noticed - he wouldn't have done anything differently even if his father had been standing there with a machine gun.

Dean left Sam frozen in the entryway and walked right up to John, literally standing toe-to-toe, and Sam half-expected him to actually poke John in the chest.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Dean demanded, hands clenched into fists by his sides.

John just looked back, calm as could be. "He has  _demon blood_  in him, Dean," he said, a faint warning note in his voice as if he were telling Dean to watch his mouth. As if the demon blood thing somehow made this  _okay_.

"You're not even going to try and deny it?" Dean blinked, unable to keep the surprise out of his voice. That wasn't the reaction he'd expected.

"He's a monster," John told him, matter-of-factly. "He's the reason Mary's dead, and now he's dragging you down the road to Hell with him."

Dean just stared at him, hardly able to believe what he was hearing. It was one thing for Sam to tell him the things John had said, second-hand, but hearing it with his own ears… clearly, there was something wrong with him. Even more so than usual, anyway.

"For Christ's sakes, Dad…!" Suddenly, Dean didn't quite know what to do. Something pretty fundamental had evidently broken in John Winchester, and Dean wasn't sure whether he should try and fix it. Whether he  _could_  fix it.

He only got a couple of seconds to think it over before John saw Sam over his shoulder, standing out in the hallway watching on, and his lip turned up in a snarl. Dean had seen less evil expressions on creatures that had tried to eat his face, and the way his father…  _changed_ in front of him like that made him flinch.

"He deserved it," John said, and turned his gaze back to Dean. His eyes were cold, like he'd been looking at a monster. Like Sam was something worth hunting. "The little slut took Mary from me, and now he's got you…  _fucking_  him!" he spat, like the words actually tasted bad.

Behind him, Dean heard Sam's pained little sob. John might be a merciless, twisted hard case, but he was still their dad - hearing him talk like that  _hurt_.

"And you deserve a helluva lot more besides!" John told him, and a hard, evil smile spread across his face as he moved for the door. Dean stepped into his path, blocking him.

"You're not going to touch him again."

Genuine amusement flickered in John's eyes as he regarded Dean. "Oh, is that so? And who's going to stop me?" He went for the door again, and without warning Dean hit him. As hard as he could possibly manage, right in the face.

Dean had never hit his father before. There had been the odd glancing blow in sparring practice, maybe, but never a full-blooded haymaker like that. They both stood there for a second, staring at each other in stunned silence. John touched an experimental hand to his lip and his eyes narrowed when it came away bloody.

"You're gonna regret that, boy." His voice was low and dangerous, and that would usually break any rebellious streak in Dean. But he knew he was the only thing standing between his baby brother and another beating - or worse - so this time he didn't move a muscle.

It wasn't that he wasn't scared - his heart rate was sky-high. He was terrified. Even though he spent his life chasing down monsters that clawed their way out of the very gates of Hell, and his dad was just a man - but that was just it. John  _was_ his father, even if he had come unhinged, and Dean had never disobeyed him in his life. Not really. Not like this.

"You're going to protect him?" John's voice got hard and Dean heard that coldness creeping in again. This time, directed at him.

"I can't let you hurt him." That icy stare scared the absolute hell out of Dean, but he didn't have a choice. He set his shoulders and stared straight back, trying not to think about every dangerous animal warning ever:  _Don't look them in the eyes_.

John considered that for a long moment that felt like an  _hour_  to Dean, standing there staring him down, but when he finally spoke there was a small smile playing on his lips.

"You know, Dean, your toy boy must be must be fucking anything with a pulse. It was kind of loose back there."

Hearing those words come out of his father's mouth made Dean's blood boil. Then there was another small sob from behind him, and that was just about all he could take.

"He's only thirteen, you sick bastard!" Dean launched himself at John with a growl, taking a full-blooded swing with his right fist.

"I'm not the one fucking him every night!" John easily ducked Dean's wild punch and shoved him hard into the wall. He bounced off it with a groan, leaving a two-foot-long dent in the plasterboard and a corresponding tear in the overlying floral wallpaper, but Dean ignored the sudden sharp pain in his right shoulder and went for John again.

"I don't have to pin him to the bed and gag him, you sadistic asshole!" he snarled, tackling his father to the floor. "And I don't make him  _bleed_!"

Dean straddled John's hips and got in a few hard shots to his face, opening up a couple of lacerations that bloodied his knuckles, but his injured shoulder made it hard for him to get full power behind the blows. They hurt, but they weren't doing the kind of damage Dean needed them to do.

John saw his opening and shoved him, pushing Dean back far enough that he could get one leg between them. He planted his foot in Dean's sternum and kicked, knocking the wind out of him and sending him staggering until the back of his legs hit the end of the bed and he fell onto it with a grunt of surprise. John was on him in a second, and he got in one vicious punch to the jaw before Dean shoved him away and managed to roll away onto the floor.

He lay there for a second on the well-worn floorboards, gasping for breath and seeing stars dancing on the off-white ceiling above him, until John hauled him roughly back to his feet by his collar. He held Dean there, keeping him upright as he landed a string of uncontested punches. Dean was a gifted fighter, and he did his best to defend himself, but he didn't have full use of his right arm and, like Sam, he just wasn't strong enough.

When John finally stopped punching and shoved him into the wall by the door, Dean's vision was starting to close in at the edges. It was like looking down a long, dark tunnel, and he didn't even see the wall coming - he felt the back of his right shoulder hit it first, sending bolts of pain radiating down his arm, then his head cracked the tough old plasterboard and the tunnel threatened to close down completely.

He saw John turn his head briefly, looking at Sam with that cold, emotionless expression. If John got past him… Dean grimaced, grabbing at the wall to try and hold himself up. He couldn't let that happen. He  _could not_  let him near Sam. Whatever it took.

When John turned back to Dean, fist cocked to deliver the knockout blow, he found himself looking down the barrel of that shiny new Colt. He blinked, surprised, and Dean took that opportunity to kick him as hard as he could in the stomach.

That knocked the breath from John's lungs, and he staggered back a few steps before he came up against the wall by the radiator. His feet went from under him and he sank to the floor, struggling to catch his breath.

Dean pushed himself off the wall, shaking his head to clear the cobwebs, and took a couple of deep, steadying breaths. He took a few small steps in John's direction, putting himself between his father and the door, but staying well out of arm's reach. He knew all too well how sneaky John could be in a fight - he'd seen it, over and over, and Dean was determined not to underestimate him now.

"What are you doing, Dean?" John's voice was strained but level as he sat up against the wall, looking warily at his eldest son. He clearly hadn't expected Dean to pull a gun on him.

"You're not going to hurt him again. I'm going to make sure of that." Dean stared down the gun at John, the sight centred on the sweet spot right between his father's eyes.

John looked from the gun to up Dean, searching for any sign of hesitation or uncertainty. He didn't see it. His eldest son's eyes were hard, and his bloody hands were rock steady as he slowly and deliberately thumbed back the hammer.

"Are you going to shoot me, son?" John asked, calmer than he had any right to be with a gun pointed at him. He actually managed to sound almost  _hurt_.

"Call me that again and we'll find out," Dean growled.

"I'm still your father, Dean."

"No. No you're not." Dean's right forefinger curled around the trigger, and John shut his mouth. He could see the safety was off.

As Dean stood there with his gun trained on his father, sitting on the floor and bleeding, he was a little surprised to realise he didn't feel bad about doing it. In fact, deep down where he should have felt remorse for doing this to his own flesh and blood, he felt justified. It was  _necessary_.

Maybe he should take it all the way. End it, here and now, forever. Sam would never have to worry about John ambushing them at some point in the future, intent on finishing what he started. Might be better that way.

He snuck a look over his shoulder at Sam shivering in the hallway, with the old blanket loose around his shoulders. He was pale, and the pupils of his wide eyes were dilated - the occasional tear escaped and rolled down his bruised and bloody cheeks, but he made no effort to wipe them away. He was obviously in shock.

Dean knew then that he couldn't pull the trigger, no matter how much John deserved it or how much he wanted this to be  _over_. Sam was hanging on by a thread already, and watching his brother murder his father in cold blood would break him.

John watched all that play out on Dean's face, calmly wiping blood out of his eyes with his free hand. He saw Dean make the decision and a little smile touched the corners of his mouth.

"You can't do it."

"Oh, I'd  _love_  to, you sick bastard. You have no idea," Dean growled, making a conscious effort to loosen his grip on the trigger. "But I'm not about to do that to Sam. You've caused enough damage for one night."

John just kept smiling. "You shouldn't wound what you can't kill, Dean."

"Don't confuse 'don't want to' with 'can't'. You come near Sam again, and that's  _exactly_  what I'll fucking do!" Dean snatched the handcuffs off the dresser with a growl and threw them at John. Not  _to_  him,  _at_  him - they hit him hard in the chest, and Dean sincerely hoped they left a bruise.

"Cuff yourself." He motioned to the metal pipe that fed the white radiator, and John did as he was told - he clasped one bracelet around the pipe, and the other around his wrist. Dean kept the gun trained on him until he heard both bracelets snap securely shut.

When he was satisfied John was safely restrained, Dean turned to the dresser and grabbed the keys to the Impala. He snagged the wallet lying beside them, too, and found a couple of hundred dollars cash inside.

"I'm taking Sam and getting the hell out of here, and you're going to forget we exist. Don't look for us. Leave us the fuck alone." He stuffed the cash into his hip pocket, but left the traceable credit cards behind.

"Or you'll shoot me?" John either couldn't or didn't want to keep that vague note of amusement out of his voice.

"There's nothing I won't do to keep Sam safe. Don't fucking tempt me," Dean told him, simply.

John didn't reply. His expression gave away nothing, but the fact he didn't come back with another smartass comment told Dean he'd made his point.

He tucked the gun into the waistband of his jeans, pocketed the car keys, then turned his back on John and went out into the entryway. Sam was standing there, shaking slightly, eyes very wide as he looked up at his big brother.

"Get your stuff, Sammy. We're getting the hell outta Dodge," Dean said.

"Where are we gonna go…?"

Dean didn't answer - he just glanced back towards John's room and put a finger to his lips. Sam nodded, getting the message, and wordlessly followed his big brother back to their bedrooms. They were packed and out the door in under five minutes.


	3. Chapter 3

Sam spent the two-hour drive to neighbouring South Dakota curled up under a blanket in the back seat of the Impala. He was fast asleep when Dean pulled into the familiar driveway of Singer Auto Salvage, lulled into dreamland by the rumble of the Impala's engine and the vibration of the tyres on the road.

He didn't wake up when Dean pulled him out of the back seat, or when he carried him up into Bobby's library and laid him gently on the couch. Dean didn't understand how he could sleep after what had just happened, but he was glad the kid found a way. Dean didn't think  _he'd_  be sleeping anytime soon, though, so he covered his baby brother with the blanket then padded into the kitchen for some well-deserved coffee.

"I'm sorry to bring this down on you, Bobby, but I don't even know where else to go." Dean sighed, leaning against the wall beside the doorway while the older hunter busied himself at the counter.

"You did the right thing, Dean," Bobby assured him, pouring them both a cup from the coffeemaker on the kitchen bench. Dean's mouth was watering just at the smell of it - the rich aroma of coffee beans roasted so dark they were very nearly burned. Just the way Bobby liked them.

Dean took the cup Bobby brought him with a nod of thanks, cradling it in both hands and letting the warmth soak through into his palms. Bobby went to sit at the little kitchen table, but Dean didn't move from his spot on the wall.

"I just had to get him out of there." He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, then took a sip of his coffee. It was strong and black and a little too hot, really, but he hadn't had anything to eat or drink since before he walked into that nightmare back in Nebraska so he didn't particularly care.

"I should have got him away sooner. I shouldn't have let this happen to him." Dean growled at himself, banging the back of his head gently against the wall a few times.

"None of us thought John'd ever go this far, Dean. He can be a right bastard when he drinks, but…" Bobby took a deep breath of his own, turning his cup around and around in place on the table. He stared through the kitchen doorway at Sam, considering his next words carefully.

"So is Sam hurt? Do we need to get him to a doctor? I mean, John must have done some damage - it's not like the kid makes a habit of sleeping with other boys," he said delicately, trying not to put too fine a point on it.

Dean sighed heavily but didn't correct him. He caught his bottom lip between his teeth, staring down at his coffee. "I think that'd be a good idea. He's trying not to show it, but he's sore. Dad knocked him around pretty good, and he was… bleeding, when I found him." He shuddered, closing his eyes.

Bobby winced, grasping Dean's meaning. "I know a local MD that will keep it quiet. We can take him around in the morning." He rubbed tiredly at his eyes and drank some more coffee. Then he pulled a battered old hip flask out of his pocket and poured a shot of whiskey into the cup as well.

That behaviour was so typically Bobby that Dean almost smiled, but before he could Irish up his own coffee there was a small moan from the library behind him as Sam stirred. Dean was by his side in a second, whiskey forgotten.

"Stay still, Sammy." Dean set his cup on the big old desk by the fireplace and knelt on the floor beside his little brother. Bobby came to stand behind him, mouth set in a tight line as he looked at the bruised and bloodied youngest Winchester laid out on his couch.

"Where am I?" Sam murmured, blinking bleary, puffy eyes.

"We're at Bobby's," Dean reminded him, gently. Sam looked around the fire-lit room, and he smiled a little when his eyes fell on Bobby.

"You feeling all right, Sam?" Bobby asked him, the concern evident in his voice.

"I'm okay," Sam protested, yawning. He wasn't in shock anymore, but he was still pale and obviously anything  _but_  okay - he started to stretch, but winced and stopped almost immediately. It hurt too much.

"After what happened you need to see a doctor, son," Bobby told him, gently. Sam didn't reply. He pushed his hair back nervously with his right hand, still holding his left close to his body.

"If your dad hurt you when-" Bobby started to go on, but Sam bit down on his lip and shook his head. He obviously didn't want to have this conversation.

Bobby sighed and sat back on the desk, giving Dean a pointed look. The message was clear:  _he needs to see a doctor and you need to convince him to do it._

Dean pulled a chair up close to the couch and leaned forward, his elbows resting on his thighs, hands clasped between his knees as he looked at Sam. "You need to get checked out, Sammy. I know you're sore, and I want to be sure he didn't hurt you," he said, in his best concerned big brother voice.

"Don't want to." He shook his head again, eyes shining with tears as he looked at Dean. He suddenly looked very young, and Dean's stomach twisted a little - he hated pressuring Sam like this. The kid had been through enough already without a stranger poking at him too, doctor or not.

"The doctor isn't going to hurt you, Sam," he said, trying to be gentle about it. "Me and Bobby just want to know you're okay."

Sam stared at him for a second, looking like a deer caught in headlights. Then he grabbed a handful of Dean's jacket and pulled him in close enough to whisper in his ear.

"The doctor is gonna  _know_." He let Dean go and sat back against the arm of the couch, looking at him meaningfully.

It took Dean a minute, but he eventually worked out what Sam was afraid of - it wasn't that he was worried about the doctor examining him, exactly. He was afraid of what would happen when the doctor worked out it wasn't the first time he'd had sex. And then, who his lover was.

Bobby watched this exchange, frowning. Blind Freddy could see there was something the Winchester boys weren't telling him.

"What else is going on here?" he asked, looking from Sam to Dean. "Look, you know you boys can tell me anything, right…?"

Sam looked at Dean, panic in his wide eyes. "He needs to know, Sammy," Dean told him, but he shook his head earnestly. A couple of tears rolled down his cheeks as he stared at his big brother, silently pleading with him not to tell.

"It's going to be okay, sunshine. He won't tell anyone," Dean said, more gently, and Sam let out a choked little sob and buried his face in the blanket. Dean had never called him 'sunshine' in front of someone else before. They'd never  _told_ anyone else before. And after what happened the last time someone found out, he didn't  _want_  anyone else to know.

Dean looked away from Sam, blinking back tears of his own. He didn't want to out his little brother like this, but Bobby was sticking his neck out for them and he deserved to know the whole story. And living under his roof, it wasn't like they could keep it a secret. Sam was going to need his big brother - his  _boyfriend_  - and Dean didn't want to have to hold back. But if he saw those doe eyes staring at him, brimming with tears, he didn't think he could get the words out.

"Dad didn't do any serious damage because… um, well, it wasn't exactly Sam's first time," Dean said slowly, trying not to put too fine a point on it.

Bobby raised his eyebrows, looking from Dean to Sam and then back again as he thought it through. They both saw it when he worked it out.

"You and Sam…?" he asked, eyes widening. Dean just nodded and cleared his throat, resisting the urge to avoid eye contact.

"So that's why John snapped..." Bobby breathed. Suddenly, a lot of things made sense. The Winchester boys had always been a little co-dependent; closer than any siblings Bobby had ever seen. There was nothing they wouldn't do for each other. It followed, he supposed, that they would do  _everything_  for each other.

He saw both boys watching him, searching his face for a reaction, and tried his best not to look shocked - he just took his hat off and ran a hand back over his hair, then pulled it back on again. He realised how much trust they were putting in him, telling him this, but…  _wow_.

"Dean isn't hurting me, Bobby," Sam said earnestly, wincing as he pushed himself into a sitting position.

"We've only been doing it for about six months-' Dean jumped in too, almost before Sam was finished speaking.

Bobby waved a hand in the air and stopped the pair of them. "It's okay, boys," he said, with what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

He turned to look at Dean first. "I know you'd never hurt the kid. If he's sleeping with you, it's because he wants to." He was pleased to see a little smile touch the corner of the eldest Winchester's mouth when he realised Bobby wasn't about to call the cops on him or something. Dean had been fully prepared to take Sam and run from Sioux Falls too, and do whatever it took to stay together and away from John, but he was glad it wasn't going to come to that.

Next, Bobby looked at Sam. "And ain't nobody going to treat you better than Dean," he said. The younger Winchester wiped at his eyes and gave Bobby a very small smile of his own.

Bobby smiled back, watching both boys visibly relax. "I wouldn't go spreading it around, though. Folks aren't going to understand," he advised.

"No kidding." Dean sniffed. He sat back in his chair and scrubbed a hand over his face, breathing a literal sigh of relief.

"Gotta say, Dean, I'm surprised. The way you chase girls, I figured you were straight as an arrow," Bobby said, a teasing note in his voice.

"Yeah, well, so did I." Dean picked his coffee up again and took a mouthful, a little smile on his lips.

"I'm adorable, apparently," Sam chimed in. He tried to smile, but the expression was tight and Dean noticed.

"Hurts, huh?" he asked, peering at Sam over the rim of his cup.

Sam nodded and pulled his left arm gingerly out from beneath the blanket. "I think it's fractured," he admitted, and allowed to Dean carefully roll up the cuff of his hoodie. The entire lower half of his forearm was swollen, and coming out in an evil-looking purple bruise.

"Aw, Sammy, why didn't you say anything?" Dean winced. His own arm ached just looking at it.

"I didn't want to give you another problem to deal with." Sam shrugged a shoulder, looking down at the blanket.

"You're not a problem, Sam," Dean told him immediately. The arm obviously hurt like hell, and he had no idea how Sam had managed to sleep on the drive to Sioux Falls.

Dean looked over at Bobby with tired eyes. "Can you call this doctor friend of yours? Sam is going to pay him a visit,  _now_." he said. Bobby nodded, and went to get his little black book.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

As it turned out, Bobby's local MD was a woman, and she made house calls. She turned upon Bobby's doorstep just before midnight, kit in hand.

Her name was Dr. Ellie Sadler and she was in her early thirties, with chestnut brown hair and golden-brown eyes, and Dean was pleased to see that Sam took an immediate liking to her. She was so warm and friendly that it was hard  _not_ to.

After confirming his arm was actually broken - probably a spiral fracture caused by John twisting it up behind his back - Bobby and Dean left her alone with Sam in the living room to do a more…  _thorough_  examination. Sam didn't look thrilled about it, and Dean offered to sit with him, but Ellie was used to dealing with traumatised kids and she put the younger Winchester at ease pretty quickly. As much as was possible, anyway.

Dean followed Bobby into the kitchen, closing the sliding doors behind him before he had to see Ellie get out the latex gloves, and sat heavily in one of the kitchen chairs. He rubbed at his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose between two fingers, taking a couple of deep, calming breaths and trying not to think about what was going on next door.

"He's going to be okay, Dean. He's a tough kid, and Ellie's done this sort of thing before," Bobby assured him, pouring another couple of cups of coffee - this time, he added the whiskey before he brought one to Dean. He took the cup the older man handed him with a nod of thanks, but he didn't look any happier.

Bobby frowned, sitting down across the table. "Look, Sam's more grown up than some adults I know." he said, trying his best to sound reassuring. "You know he can deal with all sorts of stuff that would send other kids his age running to mama."

Dean snorted derisively. "Oh, believe me, I know. He's doing all sorts of crap other kids his age don't do," he said, his voice dripping in sarcasm.

They weren't talking about hunting anymore, Bobby knew, and he took a moment to consider his words before he went on.

"So how did it…" he started, then paused and cleared his throat. He never dreamed he'd be having this conversation with Dean - or anyone else, for that matter - and damn if he knew how to ask the next question.

"I mean, how exactly  _do_  you…" he trailed off again, unable to find the right words.

Fortunately, Dean had no such trouble. "You mean, how did I get into a sexual relationship with my baby brother?" he supplied, matter-of-factly. Bobby just nodded.

"It didn't start out like that." Dean sighed, turning the coffee cup around and around in place on the table. "Sometimes, if Dad got into the scotch and started beating on us, he'd come and sleep in my bed. Company, and safety in numbers, you know?" He looked up, and Bobby gave him an encouraging nod. He still had no idea how to have this conversation, but at least Dean seemed to know what he was doing.

"Well, one night about seven or eight months ago, Dad really tied one on. He was mean - at least, meaner than usual." Dean paused for another sip of coffee. "That was the first night I thought he was actually going to hurt Sam.  _Really_  hurt him," he said, staring down at the salt and pepper shakers on the table.

"So you got in the middle and let him hurt you instead." Bobby sighed, imagining the scene. Given his own childhood, it wasn't much of a stretch.

Dean nodded, lower lip caught between his teeth. "Beat the shit outta me." He took a long, shaky breath. "But was better than him doing it to Sam. I couldn't let him do that to Sam." He unconsciously pressed a hand to the ribs on his left side as he spoke - John had broken three of them that night.

"When Dad was done, Sammy half-carried me back to my bed and he just stayed with me." Dean's eyes went out of focus as he remembered. Sam's warm, smooth body pressed up against his, holding him - soft and gentle and nice. He'd kissed Sam on the forehead, which wasn't unusual, but then Sam had returned the favour by kissing him on the lips.

"When he kissed me, I figured at first I must've had a head injury. That it had to be a hallucination." A small smile touched his lips as he remembered. Sam had needed to do it again before he realised what was going on.

"It felt _right_. And it just, you know, went from there." Dean shrugged, looking back down at his coffee. He stared pensively at the steaming brown liquid in front of him for a long moment, chewing on his bottom lip. The doubts were gnawing at him again.

Bobby had a point when he said Sam was more mature than other kids his age, but was he  _that_ mature? He was only thirteen. He was still a baby. He'd started the whole thing, and Dean loved him more than life itself, but he couldn't possibly know what he wanted yet - could he?

"What am I doing, Bobby?" Dean looked up, uncertainty all over his face and desperate for a little guidance. "Have I screwed up here? Is he too young to be  _able_  to consent…?"

"Don't you dare do that to yourself." Bobby told him, immediately. Dean just stared at him, blinking in surprise - that was a stronger reaction than he'd expected.

Bobby put his coffee cup down on the table and focused all his attention on Dean. "The poor kid needs a little bit of joy, Dean, and the way you two grew up I'm not surprised there's nothing you don't share. He's more mature than other boys his age, and  _no way_  would you ever get into this with him if he didn't consent."

"Oh, I don't doubt that he enjoys it." Dean smiled a little in spite of himself. It faded quickly, but he felt a little better. It was nice to hear that Bobby didn't think there was anything wrong.

"And he'll never find someone that treats him better than you do," Bobby went on, more gently. "It may not be exactly conventional, but it works for you two. Screw what anyone else thinks."

"Screw what _Dad_  thinks, you mean."

"Exactly." Bobby growled. "That man can be a real ass, but what he's done to Sam…"

"I almost shot him, Bobby. When he was down on the floor, handcuffed, I wanted to end it right there. I just couldn't let Sam see that." Dean sighed, rubbing at his forehead. He could feel a headache coming on.

"You think he'll come after Sam again? Does he believe you'll kill him if he tries?" Bobby asked, studying him from across the table.

"I left him in no doubt." Dean briefly bared his teeth in what could only loosely be called a smile. "But something's broken in him, Bobby. He wants to hurt Sam - I mean, he's not giving me a lot of options here." Despite what John had done, Dean still found himself trying to justify his actions. His earlier self-assurance had ebbed away with the adrenaline.

"I don't doubt it." Bobby said, and he really didn't. If John forced his hand, the older hunter was quite sure Dean would pull the trigger. He was hoping like hell it didn't come to that though, because Bobby knew a little something about it, and as far as he was concerned no son should ever have to kill his father.

It wasn't long before the doctor was done with Sam, and while Bobby brought the younger Winchester some hot chocolate and a sandwich she took Dean aside for a chat. They stood in the doorway to the kitchen, Dr. Sadler with her back to the library and Dean leaning against the doorjamb where he had an unobstructed view of Sam.

"So your father did this?" she asked, and Dean nodded.

"He's never been in danger of winning Father of the Year, but tonight was the worst he's been."

"And I guess he's responsible for this too?" Ellie was looking at the cuts and bruises on Dean's face from the fight with John. He'd run a warm washcloth over his face to wipe away the worst of it, but the lacerations needed proper cleaning.

"He didn't like that I was going to take Sam," he confirmed. "I'm okay, though!" he protested hurriedly, belatedly seeing where this was going.

Ellie, naturally, ignored him and mixed up some disinfectant anyway. She sat him on the edge of Bobby's desk, the end closest to the kitchen, and set about cleaning up his face. He winced as she wiped at a cut over his left eyebrow.

"Don't be a baby. Sam was a better patient than you are," Ellie admonished him, loud enough to make sure Sam heard. That got a chuckle from the youngest Winchester, just as she'd intended, and she smiled sadly.

"He's such a sweet kid," she said, her voice softer.

"Yeah." Dean couldn't help the little flash of a smile that touched his lips, but it was gone almost as soon as it appeared. "Is he going to be okay?" he asked, keeping his voice low.

"He's got some bruised ribs, various cuts and contusions, and some bruising and tearing from the rape," she said matter-of-factly. Dean winced again, but not because of the sting of the disinfectant.

"It's nothing that won't heal itself in a couple of weeks," she assured him. "He should be feeling better after a few days' rest, and the cast can come off in about six weeks."

Dean nodded and turned to look at Sam, sitting with Bobby. He was curled up in the corner of the couch under the blanket, with a bright white plaster cast on his left forearm and some Steri-Strips on a couple of cuts on his face. There were sticky dressings on more lacerations on his chest and back, hidden by his grey hoodie, and some strapping on his sprained ankle.

He was looking better, Dean supposed. Maybe like five miles of bad road instead of ten.

"So Sam doesn't want to report the rape?" Ellie asked, wiping gently at a laceration over Dean's right cheekbone.

"No." Dean focused all his attention back on the doctor, his green eyes searching her expression. She had a disturbingly good poker face. "Will  _you_?"

She sighed, shaking her head. "Hunters, living off the grid? It's not going to do him any good."

"You know we're hunters?" Dean was surprised, and he couldn't keep it out of his voice.

"Of course. Bobby read me in the night he turned up on my doorstep with your dad after he'd been attacked by something with teeth." She shrugged, a little smile touching the corners of her mouth. "Now I'm Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman whenever anyone in your line of work within about 100 miles gets shot, stabbed or chewed on."

Despite the situation, Dean couldn't help but smile at that. She even looked a little like Jane Seymour.

"So I'll leave Sam some antiseptic cream and a couple of scripts for some meds that will help, but Ibuprofen should be enough to manage his pain," Ellie went on, placing a Steri-Strip over a cut just below Dean's hairline as one of the phones in the kitchen started ringing. Bobby left Sam to his sandwich and went to answer it, and she waited until he was safely past them before she continued.

"There's one more thing I want to talk to you about," she said, delicately. "Seeing as you're apparently going to be his guardian now, I thought you should know: during my exam, I found evidence that this wasn't Sam's first sexual experience. There's no old injuries or scarring or anything to suggest he was abused, necessarily, but I'm sure this wasn't his first time." She looked at Dean as she spoke, watching his response.

Fortunately, Dean Winchester also had a rock-solid poker face. He couldn't deny that Sam was sexually active, but he also didn't have to tell the doctor who his partner was.

"I know Sam's had boyfriends before, and it wouldn't surprise me if he'd slept with one or two of them, but there's no way anybody abused my baby brother. Not before last night." Dean told her.

"That's what your brother said." Dr. Sadler looked at him, eyes narrowed slightly. "Honestly, I think it was consensual. Sam seems to really care about him," she admitted, with a shrug.

Dean couldn't help but smile, and Ellie's expression immediately lightened. She had no idea why that last sentence made him light up like that, but there weren't a lot of women that could resist Dean's million-watt smile when he turned it on. She knew she wasn't getting the whole story, but she also didn't think anyone was hurting Sam, and that was good enough.

"Sorry to interrupt, Ellie." Bobby appeared beside them before either one could get another word out. "Dean, do you wanna join me in the kitchen for a sec?"

He didn't get a chance to reply before Bobby grabbed a handful of his jacket and all but dragged him back into the kitchen. "Okay, okay! What's got your knickers in a knot?" Dean complained, straightening his jacket.

"That phone call I got just now." Bobby said, like that should mean something. Dean just looked at him blankly for a second, but then he realised what Bobby was talking about and the bottom fell out of his stomach.

"He  _called_ you?" Dean demanded, in a harsh whisper.

Bobby nodded, his mouth set in a tense line. "Said you'd kidnapped Sam and bolted. Wanted to know if I'd seen you boys."

"And what did you tell him?"

"Well, naturally, I told him you came straight here and I was harbouring the pair of you," Bobby said, deadpan. Dean just looked at him, not entirely sure he wasn't serious.

"Of course I didn't tell him the  _truth_ , you idjit!" Bobby rolled his eyes, and Dean wanted to smack himself over the head for that one.

"'Course you didn't. Sorry."

"I  _said_  I hadn't seen any sign of you. Even suggested you might be smart enough to run in the complete opposite direction, where he wouldn't look."

"So he  _is_  looking, then?" Dean groaned. He'd been kind of hoping John would just write them off and get back to hunting.

"He didn't sound too worried. Honestly, I think he's just pissed you stood up to him. But all the same, I think I'll just go and hide that distinctive damn Impala of yours." Bobby held out his hand for the keys.

Dean pulled them out of his pocket, but paused before he handed them over. "Thanks, Bobby. You really saved our asses." He sighed. "You're more of a father to us than he's ever been."

"I love you boys like my own, and I figure if your actual father isn't going to act like it, then  _somebody_  ought to." Bobby clapped Dean on the shoulder, then took the keys and headed out to move the Impala. Dr. Sadler walked out with him, having written out the promised prescriptions and even made an appointment to come back and see Sam for a check-up in a few days.

Dean thanked the doctor and watched them go, then went back to sit by Sam on the couch. "How you feeling?" he asked, knowing full well that was a stupid question to ask the kid on what was easily the worst night of his life. Which, among Winchesters, was really saying something.

"Not so bad." Sam twitched one shoulder in an almost imperceptible shrug and looked down at his new white cast. "My arm feels better now."

"Good." Dean bit his lip, thinking carefully about what he was about to say. He didn't want to ask, because his subconscious had more than enough material to fuel the nightmares already, but he needed to know.

"Sammy, how long did he… I mean, when did he let you go?"

"Umm… about ten minutes before you got back."

An hour. John had him for an  _hour_. The thought made Dean feel sick and he unconsciously grasped the arm of the couch, squeezing it like a stress ball. He could only imagine what it must have been like, given the foul mood John was in - and with a broken arm and bruised ribs. God, it was no wonder Sam had been bleeding…

"Sammy, has Dad ever done anything like this before? Touched you, or even looked at you sideways?" Despite what he told the doctor earlier, Dean needed to ask the question - just for his own peace of mind. He had a death grip on the couch and the wooden frame creaked as he clenched tighter, waiting for the answer.

Sam shook his head, eyes downcast as he played with a loose thread on the blanket. "He's only ever hit me before." He was quiet for a long moment, and when he looked up his eyes were brimming with tears. "Why did he do this to me?" he asked softly, his voice shaking.

That just broke Dean's heart. He reached out to put a hand on Sam's shoulder, but he shied away. He didn't even notice he did it - his body just reacted that way.

"He's all about control, Sam. What he did to you was just one more way he could be in charge," Dean told him gently, taking his hand back.

Sam shook his head, chewing on his bottom lip. "He hates me. He blames me for Mom dying."

"He doesn't hate you, he's just angry Mom's gone. And that is  _not_  your fault. None of this is your fault."

"He said I deserved it." The tears spilled over and ran down Sam's cheeks. "He called me a whore. But you're the only one I've ever…" He trailed off, looking desperately at Dean.

"I know, Sammy. I know you're not screwing around." Dean gave him what he hoped was a reassuring smile, even though he didn't  _feel_  reassuring, or remotely like smiling. "None of the things he told you are true, okay? He was just saying that stuff because he knew it would hurt you."

"I don't _want_  to do it with anyone else - it's nice with you. You're always gentle, and it doesn't hurt." Sam shifted his weight a little. No matter how he sat on the couch, he couldn't get comfortable.

"I'm sorry I let him do that to you. Any of it." Dean sighed, rubbing at his tired eyes. "I should have got you away years ago. As soon as I could drive, I should've taken you and run. I should have  _protected_  you!" he growled, talking to himself more than to Sam. He looked up in surprise when the kid reached out and grasped his hand.

"You protected me all the time. You got in between me and Dad's fists. And the way you went after him last night…" There was actual awe in Sam's eyes as he looked up at Dean. "He's bigger and stronger than you, but you did it anyway. Nobody else cares about me that much." He hesitated for a second, but then put his arms around Dean and hugged him. "Thank you."

Dean smiled in spite of himself, and hugged him back. "I love you, Sam. I'll do anything for you." he replied, like it was the most normal thing in the world. And it was, really - looking after Sam came as easily as breathing.

They sat there silently in each other's arms for a while, but it wasn't long until the drama of the day finally overwhelmed the tired kid, and Dean was just carrying the sleeping younger Winchester up to his room when they met Bobby at the foot of the stairs.

"I see the sleeping pill I put in his hot chocolate is working," the older man observed.

"I suspected as much." Dean was grateful for that. Sam needed to sleep, and chances were good he wasn't going to be able to do it on his own.

"You stay with him. There's no way I'm sleeping tonight anyway, so I'll keep an eye out, okay?" Bobby knew as well as Dean did that there was a distinct possibility John would come looking for them. That's why the Impala was hidden, and why both Dean and Bobby were walking around with a loaded handgun in their respective pockets.

"If he shows up…" Dean started, but the words stuck in his throat. He couldn't quite bring himself to say it out loud:  _If he shows up, we have to kill him._

"He can't get near Sam," he said instead.

Bobby nodded, grasping the underlying message. "He won't." He sounded as grim as Dean felt.

"Thanks."

"You boys are my family." Bobby told him, simply.

As Dean took Sam upstairs to his usual bedroom, it made him feel a little better to know that not only would John have to walk over his dead body to get to Sam, he'd have to step over Bobby's as well.


	4. Chapter 4

Sam and Dean didn't see John again after that night. He hit up a few of their friends - Pastor Jim, Caleb, and so on - looking for them, telling the same bullshit story about Dean kidnapping his baby brother and going on the run. They all knew exactly where Sam and Dean were hiding out, but they also knew why, so they kept the secret.

Dean kept track of John's movements through his aliases and the credit cards they'd applied for before everything had gone to hell in a handbasket, but after a couple of weeks he seemed to give up. He started working cases again - disappearances and unusual deaths back East, according to the newspaper articles Dean dug up - and just stopped looking for them.

The Winchester boys, predictably, stayed with Bobby in Sioux Falls. Sam started school, and Dean split his time between a part-time cash-under-the-table job as a mechanic at a garage in town and helping around the salvage yard. He changed the plates on the Impala, and with a little help from a friend of Bobby's at the DMV, got the title transferred into his name. Even so, she was always parked under cover and off the street. Just in case.

Sam didn't talk about Norfolk much - he had counselling sessions with Dr. Sadler once or twice a week, getting the kind of help Dean didn't know how to give him, and it was helping… but it was a slow process. Winter was all but over, and he'd only just now started to get the nightmares under control and sleep properly again. Most nights, anyway.

Dean did what he could for his baby brother. He'd spoken to Ellie a few times too, and she'd told him what to expect and what he could do to help - unfortunately, besides 'being there', that wasn't a whole lot. Sam didn't want to sleep in the same bed as him, or even touch him most of the time, and it drove Dean mad that couldn't do anything to help. So, seeing as he couldn't fix what was wrong with his baby brother, he turned his attention to something he could fix: the Impala.

One dark, wintry Friday afternoon in mid-April, Dean was sitting on the couch with the TV on and the Impala's neglected carburettor in pieces on the coffee table in front of him. He didn't hold out much hope for resurrecting it, but he was giving it his best shot when Sam came home after one of his regular visits to Dr. Sadler's office.

"Hey Sammy," Dean greeted him, but Sam didn't answer. He dumped his school bag by the couch and sat down next to his big brother, looking at the parts spread out over the rag-covered coffee table.

"This from the Impala?" he asked.

"Yeah. Finally fixing all the crap Dad let go." Dean sighed. It wasn't looking good, and he was getting surer and surer that Baby was going to need a new carbie.

"You know, you smell like a garage," Sam told him, wrinkling his nose. The whole room smelled like fuel and engine oil, actually - mostly because Dean's hands and clothes were covered in both.

"Occupational hazard, Sammy." Dean chuckled, wiping his hands on his jeans. "I'd do this out in the workshop, but it's kinda handy to be able to feel my fingers, you know?" There was no snow on the ground today, but it was still winter out there and numb fingers weren't useful when you were dealing with the tiny, fiddly carburettor parts.

"It's all right. I like it," Sam said, with a small smile. He hesitated for a second before he scooted over and leaned into Dean, letting him put an arm around his shoulders. Dean was surprised, but he tried not to let it show.

"You okay?" he asked softly. It was nearly ten weeks since they'd run from John, and Sam had been getting better lately, but he hadn't come looking for a hug like this since before Norfolk.

"Yeah - I just want to touch you." Sam sighed as he cuddled up to his big brother. "I miss it, you know?"

"We're touching now." Dean pointed out. He wasn't surprised this had turned into something of a chick-flick moment. After his therapy sessions Sam was often quiet and pensive, and it always made Dean want to give the kid a hug - it was nice to be able to do it for once.

"It's just that… look, I know you're not going to hurt me, but whenever you touched me…" Sam didn't want to come out and say it, but Dean knew what he meant. Whenever they tried to get close, Sam couldn't help but think about the last one to touch him: John. And that unfailingly poured a big bucket of ice water over the situation.

"It's okay, sunshine. Don't push yourself because you think I want to get back into bed with you." Dean stroked Sam's cheek with the back of his greasy fingers, then let his hand rest back on his shoulder. "I mean, I do - obviously - but only when you're ready."

Sam looked up at him, chewing on his bottom lip. "I know you like sex - we did it a lot, and I know you had girls too…" He trailed off, tucking his legs up under him on the couch.

"What we did was more than sex," Dean assured him, and kissed his temple. "And I was only with one girl since I've been with you. The whole time, I wasn't even thinking about her - I wanted to be with you."

"Really?" Sam asked, smiling. A genuine smile like Dean hadn't seen from him in weeks.

"Really." Dean smiled too, and gave Sam a little squeeze. God, it was good to be able to touch the kid again.

"I know it's taking forever, and I keep waiting for you to lose patience with me..." Sam sighed, resting his head on Dean's chest.

"Never gonna happen. You get as long as you need." Dean stroked a hand back over his baby brother's hair. With Sam cuddled up to him like this, all smooth skin and soft, floppy hair, it was hard to put into words what he had to say next.

"Look Sammy, you know I'll love you no matter what, right? Even if you didn't want to sleep together anymore," he continued, and Sam suddenly pulled back and looked at him.

"Do you want to stop?" he asked, eyes searching.

"That's not important," Dean replied, carefully. "I want you to know that if you ever do, all you need to do is tell me, okay?"

"Don't leave me." Sam's eyes shone with tears as he stared at Dean, wounded.

"I'll never leave you. That's not what I'm saying." Dean hugged him close again, crushing Sam against his chest and kicking himself for opening this can of worms just when the kid was starting to make progress. "Just… don't feel like you have to keep sleeping with me. I don't want to make you do anything you don't want."

"I like being with you. I don't wanna stop." Sam told him, wiping at his eyes with the back of his hand and then wrapping his arms tight around his big brother.

"Well that's good, 'cause neither do I." Dean smiled and kissed his forehead. He didn't actually expect Sam to want out, but it was nice to hear him say so. "I just had to ask the question, you know? Just in case…" Dean started to go on, but stopped when Sam kissed him tentatively on the lips.

He was a little hesitant at first, but then Dean felt him start to relax and before he knew it he'd grasped Sam around those slim hips and sat him over his thighs. He didn't protest - it was actually pretty nice to feel Dean's strong, gentle hands on him again. They felt nothing like John's hard, vice-like grip, and the soft, marshmallow lips pressed against his reinforced the fact for his subconscious: he was with Dean. Not John.

"I just want to make you feel good," Dean murmured against his lips, and Sam felt those warm, rough hands move up under his t-shirt, fingers running over his stomach and chest and eventually coming to rest on his ribs.

"You are," Sam whispered back. He could feel Dean's right thumb stroking the skin over one rib, and it didn't feel like John touching him. It just felt… good.

They were so wrapped up in each other that they didn't hear it when Bobby's car pulled into the driveway. They had no idea he was home until he walked in the kitchen door and the wind caught it and slammed it shut.

The noise startled both Winchester boys so much that they both jumped, and Sam bit Dean's lip hard enough to leave a mark. He yelped, more out of surprise than pain, and there was an awkward cough from the kitchen - they both looked over to discover Bobby standing there with armfuls of brown paper grocery bags.

"Glad to see Sam's feeling better," he said, setting the bags down on the kitchen table. Clearly, he had no clue what to say.

Sam flushed bright red, and didn't say a word - he climbed off Dean, hurriedly retrieved his bag, then escaped up the stairs to the safety of his bedroom. He wasn't used to people watching him making out with his big brother.

Dean watched him go, then touched a finger to his lip with a wince - it was sore, but his finger came away clean. Satisfied Sam hadn't broken the skin, he hauled himself up off the couch and went to join Bobby in the kitchen.

"Well that was awkward," Dean observed, leaning against the doorframe.

"Yeah, you're telling me." Bobby snorted, putting a couple of bottles of whiskey up into a cupboard by the stove. "But you know, you don't have to hide. It's not like I don't know what you two have been up to," he pointed out, going back to the bags and grabbing out some cans of soup.

It was a good thing Dean was shameless, otherwise that might have made him blush. "Yeah, well, it's different in motel rooms and empty random houses." He shrugged. "This is your place."

"It's your place too now, Dean. I want you boys to feel comfortable," Bobby said, turning to face him. He sat back against the bench and crossed his arms, studying the eldest Winchester.

"We do feel comfortable," Dean said, shrugging a shoulder. "I mean, ever since Sammy was six months old, your place is the closest thing we've had to a home."

"Well that's good to hear," Bobby said. "I'm just not sure I want you more comfortable than that on my couch, though!" he added, with a smile.

"Don't worry, we'll put a sock on the doorknob or something next time." Dean chuckled.

Bobby paused for a second before he continued, trying to work out how to ask the next question. "So, does that mean Sam wants to…?" He trailed off, twirling a finger in the air in a 'you know' kind of gesture.

Dean groaned, resting his head against the doorframe. "Argh - I don't know, Bobby. He wants to. Whether he can or not... that's different." He sighed, rubbing at his eyes with one hand. This was progress, though, and progress was good.

"I just want him to really be ready, and I thought it might take longer, you know? After what Dad put him through, I would have understood if he didn't even come out of his room for six months." Dean went on, but an involuntary little smile touched his mouth as he licked his lips. He could still taste Sam, and he hadn't realised until now just how much he missed it. It was a good thing Sam hadn't wanted out, because Dean wasn't sure how he would've coped with that.

"That's one tough kid, to survive all the crap life's dumped on him." Bobby agreed, and then set about unpacking the brown paper bags again. He was pleased to see Sam making progress too.

"You know, Dean," he added pointedly, "if this were actually your home, you'd be helping me with the groceries."

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

That night, Dean lay in bed wide awake and staring up at the ceiling. It was nearly midnight but sleep stubbornly refused to come - he couldn't stop thinking about those few minutes spent with Sam on the couch.

That was the closest they'd been in weeks - months - and he really hadn't realised just how much he missed that firm, warm body pressed up against his, and the feel of Sam's soft skin under his fingers. He'd even missed winding his hand into that floppy Goddamn hair…

Dean sighed, eyes closed as he remembered, and was just sliding a hand down into his boxers when he heard a noise at his bedroom door. His whole body went stiff, and his eyes flew open to stare into the darkness.

The knob rattled a little as someone turned it from the outside, and a beam of light spilled across the floor as they opened the door a crack. Dean automatically reached for the stainless steel Colt in his nightstand drawer, eyes fixed on the widening gap.

"Dean? You awake?" Sam called softly.

"Yeah, Sammy." Dean rolled his eyes, shutting the drawer with a sigh and laying back on his pillow. Sam shut the door behind him and padded over, and the older Winchester pulled the covers back so he could get in.

"I nearly shot you, you know," Dean pointed out, wrapping his arms around his baby brother. Sam just chuckled, cuddling up to him. His skin was cool against Dean's and his feet were freezing - Dean didn't know it, but he'd spent the last few minutes pacing the threadbare runner in the hallway getting up the courage to open the door. Now, laying there with his big brother, Sam was sure he would hear his heart racing in his chest.

"So, I didn't expect to see you," Dean told him, softly.

"I couldn't stop thinking about this afternoon," Sam said, and fleetingly pressed his lips to Dean's. "It felt so good to be with you. I hardly thought about him at all."

Dean's own heart rate climbed a few notches then. "Are you saying… I mean, do you want to…?"

"Can we try?" Sam asked, hopefully, and Dean couldn't help the smile that spread across his face. He kissed Sam's smiling lips, and gasped when he felt the kid's hand slide down between them and start rubbing gently at the front of his boxers. He hadn't expected that.

"Christ, you're not wasting any time, are you Sammy?"

"I've been thinking about this all day," he replied, smiling. "And it looks like you're ready, too."

Dean laughed, and Sam let his big brother turn him over to lay face down on the bed. He took a few deep breaths as Dean pulled his boxers off and straddled his hamstrings, softly kissing the back of his neck while he rubbed a hand slowly up and down his spine. He placed a trail of those soft kisses all the way up from Sam's shoulders, across his neck and along his jawline, until Sam turned his head to the side with a little smile and accepted a soft, lingering kiss on the lips.

He sat back up and kneaded Sam's lower back with both hands, and was kind of surprised not to feel any uncertainty in his baby brother - but he wasn't about to look this gift horse in the mouth. It was nice to be sitting over Sam like this, touching that soft, smooth skin of his back, and he didn't want to stop. The kid would tell him if he was feeling uncomfortable, anyway…

Dean let his hands drift down to the pale, flawless skin of Sam's ass, and he sucked in a quick breath when he felt Dean touching him there. He didn't tense up, though, so Dean squeezed a little - that drew a delicious little keening noise from his baby brother, and Dean sucked in a sharp breath of his own as every last drop of blood that wasn't already there tried to cram itself into his cock.

"Do it." Sam breathed.

"Huh?" Dean asked, blinking. He was still preoccupied with that maddening little moan.

"Do it." Sam repeated, louder.

"I don't wanna hurt you," Dean said, after a second's pause to think that through. He'd love nothing more than to dive right in, but he knew he should to start with a finger or two, at least…

"It's okay. I like it, remember?" Sam assured him, hoping Dean couldn't hear his heart thumping in his chest.

"How could I forget?" Dean breathed, and kissed the back of his neck one more time before he turned on the bedside lamp to find a condom in the drawer. Sam rested his cheek on the back of his hands and watched him retrieve the little foil package, plus a tube of lube.

"You came prepared, huh?" he asked, and Dean chuckled.

"Well, I knew we'd get here at some point, and I'll be damned if we're using gun oil again."

Sam had to laugh at that. Dean was talking about that night they'd spent alone in a derelict cabin in the California mountains, when they hadn't even had a sleeping bag, let alone their KY. The only thing they did have was a rifle and its cleaning kit.

"Yeah, that stuff took days to wash off properly," he conceded, still smiling.

"I kept you warm though, didn't I?" Dean leaned over and kissed his cheek, then ruffled that floppy brown hair a little. "Don't worry, Sammy. I'll be gentle with you," he said, softer.

Sam felt a knee between his, encouraging him to open his legs a little. He was breathing deep and slow, eyes fixed on the lamp beside the bed, trying his best to stay relaxed. He knew Dean would try to be gentle - Dean was always gentle - but it had been weeks, and Sam knew it was going to hurt at first.

Honestly, he just wanted to get it over and done with. Once they were sleeping together again, that meant he could close the door on Norfolk. He could get on with his life and enjoy being with his boyfriend again. He wrapped his arms around the pillow, hugging it close to his chest, and waited.

Dean was kneeling in between Sam's thighs, rubbing a hand up and down his lower back while he reached down to slip a finger inside, when Sam suddenly yelled out and leapt up off the bed. His shoulders hit Dean's chest so hard the breath was knocked out of him.

He sat back on his heels, dazed and gasping for air, and dimly noticed Sam sink down to sit on the rug beside the bed. It took his confused big brother a good ten seconds before he was able to climb down and sit beside him.

"What the hell was that?" Dean wheezed, stretching his legs out and leaning stiffly back against the bed with one arm across his ribs. He had absolutely no clue what had made Sam freak out like that.

Sam didn't answer at first. He just sat there, legs pulled up tight against his chest and his face buried in his knees. His shoulders were shaking, and it took the dazed older Winchester a second to realise that was because Sam was crying. Not the tears-rolling-down-his-cheeks kind of thing he usually did, but deep, wracking sobs that shook his entire body.

"Sammy? What's wrong?" Dean asked, more gently. He was thoroughly confused - how the hell had he screwed this up? He'd gone slow, being as gentle as he could and watching for any sign his baby brother wasn't coping…

"I can't. The flowers on the sheets...!" Sam sobbed, and threw his arms around Dean.

"What the...?" Dean hugged him back and turned to look over his right shoulder, furrowing his brow. There were indeed floral sheets on the bed - with little yellow roses on them, in fact. They weren't to Dean's taste, really, but sheets weren't something that would usually reduce Sam to tears...

It took him a moment to realise that those yellow roses looked familiar, and another moment to realise where he'd seen them before.

"Oh, Sammy." Dean sighed, feeling like a real idiot. He'd seen those flowers back in Norfolk. The poor kid had freaked out when he found himself face-to-face with the same floral pattern that had been on John's bedspread.

Before Dean could say anything more there was the sound of footsteps racing up the stairs, and Bobby opened the bedroom door. He immediately saw the condom wrapper on the bed, and the tube of lube, and realised what they'd been doing. Or trying to do.

Dean saw him in the doorway before he could open his mouth. "It's okay," he assured the older hunter, even as Sam was sobbing pitifully in his arms.

"Dean-"

"I got it, Bobby." Dean gave him a pointed look. Bobby didn't look happy about it, but he nodded and shut the door anyway. Dean heard his footsteps on the old floorboards as he walked back to the stairs, leaving the Winchester boys alone.

"What's wrong with me?" Sam buried his head in Dean's shoulder, and he felt warm, wet tears running over his skin.

"There's nothing wrong with you," Dean whispered, stroking his hair soothingly. "It's not your fault. You're just not ready yet."

That sounded ridiculous even to Dean's ears, but he couldn't think of anything else to say - he didn't actually know what had gone wrong. Apart from the fact those sheets reminded Sam of John's bedroom, anyway… but who knew. Maybe that was enough? Dean was starting to feel distinctly out of his depth.

Sam sniffed and started to get up, but Dean caught his wrist. His hand went all the way around, fingertips touching.

"Don't run away, Sam."

"Lemme go, Dean. I wanna be alone," Sam told him, wiping at his eyes with his other hand as he tried to pull free.

"Well I don't think you should be," Dean told him, keeping his grip on Sam's wrist. He didn't like the idea of the kid spending the night by himself - not one bit. Not after this.

"I'll be okay." Sam kept trying to pull his wrist out of Dean's grasp, though. "Let me go!" he demanded, looking down at Dean with an anguished expression and eyes full of tears when he realised he couldn't get his arm free - he needed Dean to let him go.

"Christ - I'm sorry, Sammy." The older Winchester suddenly realised what he was doing, restraining a rape victim, and he immediately released his grip. Sam rabbited back to his own room before Dean could get another word out.

He sat there leaning against his bed, one hand rubbing at his eyes, listening as Sam slammed and locked his door and climbed into his slightly creaky old bed. It hurt Dean to hear him crying like that - it was an actual, physical pain deep in his chest, and he wanted to go and give his baby brother a hug and tell him it was going to be okay, but he knew that was the last thing Sam wanted. That kinda hurt too.


	5. Chapter 5

Dean didn't see a lot of Sam for a few days after that. He stayed at school, at the library, in his room - whatever it took to get away from the world in general. When Dean  _could_  get him to say more than three words in a row, the kid insisted he was okay.

Dean wanted to talk about what had gone so spectacularly wrong, and why he reacted so violently out of the blue like that, but Sam wasn't having a bar of it. He just 'wanted some time'. And as he pointed out, he  _was_  still talking to Ellie, so rather than fight about it Dean let him have his alone-time. Sam would tell him when he was ready.

With Sam pushing him away Dean went back to the other love of his life, but it was Wednesday afternoon before he got a chance to get back into the workshop. Well, it was a glorified two-car garage, really, with a wooden frame and tin walls. There were engine belts and hoses and calendars hung from nails driven into the wood, a workbench, a big old Craftsman toolbox that was about as tall as Sam and full of thousands of dollars' worth of tools, and a collection of jacks and incompressible stands and all the other stuff you invariably find in a mechanic's workshop. One thing it  _didn't_ have, however, was a heater.

There were snow flurries forecast for that night, but that didn't put Dean off. Sam would be home from school (and therapy) soon, and as far as he was concerned the rest of the evening was better spent in the frigid workshop than sitting inside trying to act like everything was normal when it so obviously wasn't. And Baby needed the attention, too.

Now that she was his, he was taking care of all the little problems John had let go. She'd been running rough lately, there was a knocking noise from deep inside the engine, and what had started out as a small oil leak back by the transmission was rapidly turning into a river. John had been content to top up the oil every couple of weeks, but Dean couldn't bring himself to let that beautiful old car keep driving around injured like that. But as soon as he'd taken a good look under the hood, he'd realised the rear main seal was just the  _start_  of their problems.

Not only was her carburettor beyond repair, the radiator was past its use-by date too, and there was green, rusty water seeping out from at least two of the welsh plugs in the sides of the engine block - Dean was all too aware that it was very likely the remaining six weren't far behind. And those were just the problems he could  _see_. He hadn't even gotten to that knocking noise yet.

This nasty, dirty repair job was rapidly turning into more of a minor engine overhaul, and that sort of thing was much easier with the big V8  _outside_  the car, so that was exactly what Dean intended to do - an engine stand stood off to the side of the workshop, waiting. On the bright side though, Bobby had procured a brand-new Holley 4-barrel carburettor to bolt on when the job was done.

Dean had barely even got the hood up when he heard gunshots outside, from the direction of Bobby's home-made firing range. He listened to the regular, sustained fire that continued for 9 shots until the clip was empty, stopped for 10 seconds, then started again after Sam had reloaded.

Dean knew without needing to look that it was Sam. The kid was a good shot, and would be a  _spectacular_  shot if he put even half as much effort into his shooting as he did into his schoolwork. But that wasn't why he was out practicing.

Ellie had warned Dean that his little brother was going to do everything he could to make himself feel like he was in control - he'd want to get his power back after John had stripped him of it. Apparently for Sam, getting his power back involved feeling like he could protect himself; and for a kid that could already beat the crap out of most adults and use almost every kind of weapon ever invented, that meant getting  _better_  at that stuff.

Sam had gravitated towards target practice with handguns, something he'd put the bare minimum of effort into up until now. Dean figured that knowing he wasn't physically big enough to kick John's ass, Sam wanted to defend himself from a distance instead. He'd been doing this target-practice thing regularly since he'd gotten his cast off, but after the disaster with the floral sheets last Friday, Sam had ramped up his training regime from shooting a couple of times every three or four days to doing it  _every_  day.

Dean leaned on the Impala's quarter panel with a sigh, looking into the engine bay as more shots rang out. "I understand  _you_ , baby. I know exactly what's broken, and I can fix it." He chewed on his bottom lip, looking at the badly-corroded radiator, then reached in and set about unscrewing the hose clamps and tried not to think about Sam.

"So this knocking noise of yours isn't going be a damaged piston or anything, is it baby?" Dean asked the car gently, kicking an oil pan along the floor and into position to catch some leftover fluid that escaped the drained radiator. "You wouldn't do that to me, would you? Make me get your cylinders rebored and all that?" He patted the rocker cover his left hand was resting on. His luck had to get better sometime, right?

Dean was so involved in what was going on under the Impala's hood that he didn't notice when the gunshots stopped. He was just pulling the radiator up out of its brackets when Sam opened the door of the workshop, and the sudden noise made him jump.

He swore and hit his head on the Impala's hood, dropping the radiator on the concrete floor by his feet, and although he threw a hand out to catch it he couldn't stop the hood slipping off the prop rod. It slammed shut with an almighty  _bang_  that reverberated through the building - Dean actually felt it through the floor.

He slowly turned to face Sam, frozen mid-step in the half-open doorway, lit from behind by the last rays of the setting sun. He looked from Dean down to the dented radiator, leaking brownish-green water all over the floor, and then back again.

"Sorry," he said, with a wince.

Dean heaved a sigh and looked up to the roof, letting his eyes fall closed. His heart was still racing in his chest.

He knew Sam hadn't  _meant_  to scare the crap out of him, but he'd almost smashed his foot with that radiator, the hood very nearly made a pancake of his hand, and all Sam had to say for himself was  _"Sorry"_ …?!

"It's fine." Dean took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. "But maybe next time you could  _knock_?" he suggested, giving Sam a pointed look before he bent down to pick up the twisted radiator. He went past his baby brother and set it outside, leaning up against the wall of the building so any remaining murky water could drain out. Most of it was probably already on the floor in the workshop, but oh well.

When he came back in, Sam was looking at all the parts laid out on the workbench - the battery, air intake, and the fan assembly that usually sat behind the radiator, plus assorted hoses, bolts and wires and the new carburettor, still in its box. He hadn't been out to the workshop in a while, and looked surprised to see the Impala in pieces like that.

"What's going on here?" he asked, nodding at the bench as he leaned against the driver's side door.

"She needs a little TLC, Sammy," Dean sighed, wiping some of the dirt and water off his hands with a rag he kept tucked in his back pocket. "Me and Sam weren't the only ones he was treating badly, were we baby?" He touched a small spot of rust on the Impala's hood, by the headlight on the passenger side. He had a feeling there were a lot more little wounds like that.

Sam looked from Dean to the car and back again, eyebrow raised slightly. He didn't quite understand the depth of Dean's feeling for two tonnes of rolling metal, but he didn't say anything.

"So what brings you here, Annie Oakley?" Dean asked, picking up a spanner that had fallen onto the floor. He shook some murky radiator water off it and went over to set it on the bench with the other tools.

"Well, Ellie wants me to tell my boyfriend something." Sam paused, wrapping his arms around himself against the cold South Dakota dusk.

Dean looked up at him, eyebrows raised - the message was for 'the boyfriend' because they still hadn't told the doctor exactly who Sam was sleeping with. She didn't like that, but Sam wasn't going to spill and he needed her help, so she was letting it slide.

"We were talking about you and me, and about how… about what it's like in bed."

"Well I hope you gave me good reviews." Dean quipped, quick as a flash. He pulled a bigger rag off the bench and bent down to mop up the water on the floor, wondering exactly where this was going.

Sam smiled, watching his brother's old black t-shirt pull up over the waistband of his jeans, exposing the muscular, faintly-tanned lower back beneath. He couldn't believe how lucky he was sometimes. His boyfriend was gorgeous, inside and out.

"I told her I had you wrapped around my little finger," he shot back. Dean chuckled at that, getting up to hang the wet rag over one of the workshop rafters to dry.

"We were talking about the last time we tried it, the other night," Sam went on, more seriously.

Dean sighed and looked away, arms crossed over his chest as he perched on the end of Impala's hood.  He meant when he'd had that flashback and wound up sobbing on the floor, and just the memory of it made Dean's stomach start tying itself in knots.

"She wanted me to tell you that you didn't do anything wrong - it wasn't your fault I freaked out and almost broke your ribs. You know that, right?"

Dean chewed on his lower lip, staring at the floor and thinking that over. He  _wanted_ to believe it wasn't his fault, but he couldn't help thinking he'd brought it on somehow - maybe he should have insisted they wait a while longer, or that Sam was on top or something. God,  _anything_  but face down on the bed…!

"Dean?"

Dean blinked and looked up to find Sam looking at him intently, searching his face for a response.

"I know, Sammy. But it was kind of hard not to take that personally." The words were out of Dean's mouth before he even knew he was speaking, and he winced. It was true, but it came out a lot harsher than he would ever have intended and the look on Sam's face made it clear that it hurt.

"I'd never push you away like that. You've only ever been gentle with me," Sam said, frowning as he ducked his head and scuffed his foot on the concrete floor of the garage. "In my head, it wasn't  _you_  on top of me, you know?"

Sam didn't quite know how to put it into words, and it took Dean a second understand what he was trying to say, but he suddenly understood why he'd reacted so violently.

It wasn't just that the bedspread  _reminded_  Sam of Norfolk; seeing it had taken him back there and dropped him right back into that living hell. When he freaked out and jumped up, almost caving in Dean's ribcage in the process, he thought he was back in John's bedroom - the flashback had been so vivid that Sam really thought he was shoving his father off him. God, it was no wonder he'd freaked out!

Dean was so busy with his epiphany that it took him a second to realise Sam was talking. "- that apparently flashbacks aren't uncommon. A smell or a phrase or something triggers it, usually." He was still looking down at the floor.

"It's okay, sunshine. I didn't like how it felt, you pushing me away, but I know you weren't shoving  _me_  - not really." Dean assured him, going over and gathering his baby brother up into a bear hug before he could ramble on any further.

"Thanks," Sam said, smiling a little as he inhaled that familiar 'Dean' smell - sweat and engine oil. It made him feel safe, and Dean felt it in the way Sam relaxed in his arms, the younger Winchester's body moulding itself to his. He hadn't relaxed like this the last time - not completely.

"You know,  _before_  that, it was fun…" Sam trailed off as Dean rubbed a hand up and down his back, smiling to himself. He knew exactly what the kid was trying to say.

"So, if I take you upstairs right now, you're not going to try and kill me this time…?" he joked. That got a smile from Sam, but that's all - he just couldn't quite bring himself to laugh. Dean didn't blame him.

"Sorry. Sometimes I just can't control my inner smartass." Dean leaned in and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

Sam chuckled this time, and Dean pushed him gently up against the driver's side door of the Impala. Sam stood up on his tiptoes, trying to get in close for a kiss, and yelped in surprise when Dean locked his hands around his waist and lifted him up to sit on the car's front quarter panel.

"Come and have a hot shower with me," Dean murmured, wrapping his arms around his baby brother. It was cold in the giant tin shed, and although the Impala had kept Dean nice and warm, Sam didn't have a jacket on and he was obviously feeling it.

"Can't we just do it in the car…?"

"And clean all this grease off the seat?" Dean smiled wolfishly, wiping an oily finger down Sam's cheek and leaving a black streak. Sam grimaced, wiping at it with his palm, but Dean just laughed and dragged him out of the workshop and back to the house, then up to the bathroom.

Dean made sure he did it right the second time round. He turned the shower on nice and hot and went slowly, lathering up his hands and washing Sam all over. It had been months since Dean had been able make the kid feel good, but he was going to change that.

It was nice to get his hands on his little brother again, but he was careful to always keep Sam in front of him. He didn't turn him around, push him against the wall of the shower - nothing like that. He wanted Sam to be able to see him, so he wouldn't forget who was touching him this time.

He was doing a good job of it too, because Sam wasn't thinking about that. As much as Dean liked touching him, he liked  _being_  touched. It was good, feeling gentle, soapy hands rubbing over his back, his chest, and up and down his ribs and stomach, then the soft, sensitive skin of his hips and pelvis, leading down to his thighs…

Sam pressed his chest against Dean's, tilting his face up for a kiss from those soft, velvety cushions of lips. He felt Dean rest one hand at the small of his back, the other one coming to rest on his ass as Dean pulled him in close, pressing Sam's body so close up against his that not even the water ran between them.

Sam was okay with all of that. He stood there under the hot running water in his big brother's arms, happy to let Dean touch him - then Dean ran a soapy hand down between his butt cheeks, and he flinched and pulled away a little. That was the first time anyone had touched him  _there_  since the night John attacked him.

Dean felt the tension in him, and pulled Sam back against his chest and held him there. "It's okay, Sammy. Remember how good it feels?" he whispered.

"It's been a long time since anything felt good," Sam said softly. He took a long, shaky breath as he laid his head on Dean's chest, trying to control his climbing heart rate. Dean had only touched him gently, and Sam knew he was completely safe here with his big brother, but he still associated anyone touching there with the pain John had caused him. The touch itself didn't hurt, but the memories did.

Dean felt him relax a little after a few seconds and a couple of deep breaths. He rubbed up and down Sam's lower back a few times, feeling him relax further. He didn't say a word, but Sam knew what was coming, and he let Dean stroke that finger down over his ass again. He sucked in a sharp breath, but this time he didn't pull away.

Dean kept stroking the tight little ring of muscle back there but it took a minute before Sam really relaxed, his mouth falling open in a breathy moan. Dean smiled and rubbed some more, and it wasn't long until Sam was pressing back against him. In fact, he pushed the first finger inside all on his own.

He gasped, and was reflexively pulling away when Dean caught him and pulled him tight against his torso. Sam let out a little mewling noise, and Dean could feel the uncertainty in him. He wanted to slip another finger inside, like he would have ten weeks ago, but he stopped himself. He was already pushing Sam's limits and he didn't want to fuck this up.

"Does it hurt?" he asked, his lips only centimetres from Sam's ear.

"No." Sam's voice was very, very soft and Dean struggled to hear it over the water.

"Do you want me to stop?"

There was a pause, then a very quiet "No."

Dean smiled and stroked a hand back over Sam's damp hair. He turned his face up, and Dean kissed him as he slid that second finger inside. His mouth muffled Sam's little groan and he unconsciously rolled his hips against Dean's as he worked those fingers in a little deeper.

"Almost forgot how good that is." Sam murmured, his lips just touching Dean's. "Just hurt so much last time…" he went on, sounding almost apologetic.

"I know, sunshine," Dean kissed him again. He completely understood why Sam had been reluctant at first.

Sam's skin was still hot to the touch when he let Dean take him over to the bed. He sat back against the headboard and sat Sam across his thighs, but before the younger Winchester could start overthinking it he pulled him in close and kissed him. It wasn't until Dean reached down between them and wrapped his hand gently around Sam's achingly hard cock that he stopped and pushed Dean back a little.

He opened his eyes and looked at Sam, obviously confused. "You wanna stop?" he whispered, trying not to sound disappointed.

Sam shook his head, taking a deep breath. "No. I just… don't do it from behind, okay? I want to look at you. I'll be okay if I can see you," he added, and Dean nodded.

"I want to get lost in you again. Like I used to." Sam rested his forehead against Dean's, and the older Winchester smiled. His baby brother was awesome. John did his level best to break the kid, but here he was, coming out the other side. And he was okay, more or less.

"I love you, Sammy." That was all Dean could think of to say.

"I know. I love you too." Sam smiled and kissed Dean gently on the lips. "Now make me forget all about him."

They both knew that wasn't possible, but Dean was going to try.

He was about to lift Sam off him when an idea struck him. Instead of laying his baby brother back on the bed, Dean got up off it and pulled Sam up with him.

"What the-" Sam started, but Dean silenced him with a kiss. Then he pulled the comforter off the bed and spread it out on the floor in one corner of the room, where a small electric heater was glowing orange in its faux fireplace. Sam immediately realised what he was doing, and a smile spread across his face as he watched Dean bring over a couple of pillows.

"You can't say I'm not romantic." The eldest Winchester smiled, and pulled Sam down into the comforter with him.

"You get brownie points for this one," Sam admitted, letting Dean lay him back against the pillows. "But no flowers?" he continued, before Dean could get a word in.

Dean's eyes sparkled as he looked down at his baby brother. "If you want, I could hit 'pause' here and go get you some dandelions or something from the yard," he offered.

"You're an ass."

"My ass is what you like best about me." Dean replied, grinning.

"Nuh-uh. I like these better." Sam reached up and touched Dean's lips with one finger. Dean kissed his fingertip, then suddenly opened his mouth and sucked it in all the way down to the second knuckle. Sam's eyes widened and his mouth dropped open in a moan, and Dean's lips turned up in a little smile.

Dean deliberately kept Sam's mind on him, kissing and touching and caressing - before the younger Winchester knew it, he had the lube out and the condom on. He knelt in between Sam's thighs and rested his baby brother's legs over his quads, then leaned over for a kiss. When he laid a hand on Sam's chest, he felt his heart racing.

"You okay?" he whispered.

"Mm-hmm." Sam nodded once, his big hazel eyes fixed on Dean. He was breathing faster now, and his whole body was tense.

"You weren't this nervous the first time."

Sam laughed breathlessly, and Dean kissed him again. "I'm gonna look after you, sunshine. It'll be awesome." He pressed his lips to Sam's again, and felt his little brother noticeably relax.

"Keep your eyes on me, okay?" Dean looked straight back at Sam, focusing on those hazel eyes as he flicked the top off the tube of lube.

Sam did just that, studying all the little dark flecks in his big brother's deep green eyes, but he couldn't stop himself sucking in a quick breath when he felt Dean's cock rubbing against his ass. It was hot and hard and slippery, and this was where it had all gone wrong last time…

His breath caught in his throat when he felt Dean start to push, and just as his heart rate was threatening to skyrocket he felt Dean's hand on his side, rubbing soothingly over his ribs, down to his hip, and then up again. Those marshmallow lips pressed down on his, demanding his attention.

Dean felt him relax again and pushed a little harder, then the resistance just disappeared and he suddenly slipped in an inch or two. Sam gasped and arched his back, letting out a little cry that was more pain than pleasure, but Dean didn't stop pushing until he was all the way inside.

He stayed close to Sam and kept his hands on him, stroking gently, and kissing his cheeks and his neck and his lips, and anywhere else he could reach. He kept Sam there with him, in the moment, and before he realised what was happening he'd relaxed and stretched out enough that Dean could start moving. He rolled his hips gently and rhythmically, and Sam opened his eyes to find Dean's green ones looking down at him.

"Forgot how tight you were," Dean breathed.

"Me too." Sam groaned, shifting slightly under him. His hands were resting on Dean's quads, his fingers digging into the big muscles there.

"You good?"

"Awesome." Sam confirmed, with a little smile. "Don't hold back," he whispered, staring directly into Dean's eyes. The older Winchester looked back, his eyes sparkling. He'd been waiting months for Sam to want that.

He gripped the back of Sam's legs just above his knees, palms on the end of his hamstrings, and pushed his legs back a little further. Sam watched him, breathing in short gasps, and let his big brother position him just where he wanted. He was flexible enough for Dean to get his knees up far enough that they were nearly touching his chest.

Dean leaned over with his hands pressed to the floor on either side of Sam, his baby brother spread wide open beneath him, knees hooked around his elbows. Sam brought his head up off the pillow and pressed his lips to Dean's - he was perfectly comfortable folded up like a pretzel, wrapped around his big brother.

Dean started off a little slow, but that didn't last long. The way Sam groaned as every thrust pushed him back down against the floor, biting Dean's lower lip when he kissed him…

Dean disentangled his arms from behind Sam's knees and straightened up a little, planting his hands on the floor on either side of Sam's chest. He could use the big muscles in his abdomen now, and he went for it. Really went for it, just like Sam had asked.

Sam arched his back and cried out, grabbing two handfuls of the bedspread beneath him. He brought his arms up behind his head, every muscle taut and fingers locked tight, with his eyes squeezed shut and that rosy bottom lip caught between his teeth. That did nothing to muffle the groans and the little cries of pleasure, and if he'd been able to string together two thoughts, he might have been concerned that Bobby would be able to hear him.

Dean almost didn't want to come - it was so good to hear Sam cry out in pleasure instead of pain, and to see that blissful expression on his face. But it wasn't going to take long, because it had been so long since they'd done this and Dean hadn't been with anyone else the whole time. He just wasn't going to fucking  _last_ …

Dean squeezed out a little more lube onto his palm, then reached down and wrapped his hand around Sam. His little brother was just as hard as he was and his eyes flew open when he felt Dean's hand on him, the fresh lube still cool against the heat of the sensitive skin.

"Not gonna last much longer," Dean breathed, "so I'mma take you with me."

The younger Winchester felt a flicker of disappointment that it was going to be over so soon, but lost that train of thought completely when Dean started working that hand up and down his length in time with his own thrusts.

It didn't take long. Sam had only touched himself a couple of times since Norfolk, and Dean knew just how to get him off. Stealing a few minutes at a time when John wasn't looking meant he knew exactly what his baby brother liked, and he was using his best technique - even that little twist at the end that drove Sam mad, flicking his wrist like he was taking the top off a beer bottle…

Sam's entire body tensed and he bit down on his lower lip in an effort to strangle a shout of ecstasy, but Dean didn't let go. He kept stroking up and down, slower now, until his little brother's chest was heaving and his washboard abs were sprinkled with milky white threads.

Dean held on for as a long as he could, enjoying the sight in front of him, but the way Sam's body tightened around him sent him over the edge almost immediately after. He arched his back and bit back a cry of his own, letting his head fall back as his orgasm washed over him. He didn't notice that he squeezed Sam's hips so hard he left dark, finger-shaped bruises, but the younger Winchester didn't complain. He loved seeing the pleasure on Dean's face as much as Dean had enjoyed seeing it on his.

When Dean finally opened his eyes, Sam was looking back up at him. There was a lazy, sated little smile on his lips and a pretty little pink flush to his cheeks, and he was obviously absolutely spent. His whole body was relaxed and he was sucking in deep, slow breaths, just looking back up at his big brother from under the lashes of his half-lidded eyes. He was  _gorgeous_.

He sighed when Dean slipped out, stretching out on the comforter with a little satisfied little groan, with Dean still kneeling in between his thighs. Dean leaned in over him, resting one hand on either side of his body, elbows bent just enough for his lips to touch Sam's in a long, slow kiss.

"Told you I'd look after you," he breathed, his lips brushing Sam's as he spoke. Sam just chuckled, a little breathlessly - he couldn't quite form whole sentences just yet. It had been a while since Dean been able to do that to him, and… well, Sam didn't have words for it. And no inclination to think them up, either.

Dean just smiled, using a t-shirt they'd dropped on their way into the shower to wipe his baby brother clean. Sam was all but asleep by the time he'd finished, completely worn out - emotionally and physically. He groaned a little in protest when Dean dragged him to his feet, but the older Winchester ignored him. He wasn't about to sleep on the floor all night, and since he wasn't going to bed without Sam either, then he was just going to have to come too. Whether he liked it or not.

Sam chuckled when Dean swept him up into his arms and carried him over to the bed - he was still awake enough to be amused, apparently. He wriggled under the covers while Dean threw the comforter back over the bed, and nestled up against him when he got in too.

Cuddling like this was something else they hadn't done since the last time they saw John, and as Dean hugged Sam close with the warm skin of the younger Winchester's back pressed up against his chest, he realised that as good as the sex was, he'd missed this even more. He could smell Sam's hair, and that musky, earthy scent he loved, just under the soap from their shower. He could feel Sam's body against his, warm and smooth and totally relaxed. Dean licked his lips, smiling - he could still taste him, too.


	6. Chapter 6

As soon as Bobby stepped off the stairs the next morning and saw what was going on in his kitchen, his face broke into a grin. He stood in the doorway, leaning against the jamb, and just watched for a minute - this wasn't something he saw every day.

Dean was in the kitchen with the little radio on the windowsill tuned to the local rock station. They were playing Led Zeppelin, and he was humming to himself as he prodded at a frying pan of bacon sizzling on the old electric stove.

"Some people cry and some people die by the wicked ways of love; but I'll just keep on rollin' along with the grace of the Lord above..."He was even singing softly under his breath as he turned the bacon, smiling and tapping his left hand on the bench while he grooved along with the music.

Bobby chuckled to himself and continued on into the kitchen - Dean had put a pot of coffee on, too, and he made a beeline for it. It was only then that Dean realised he wasn't alone, and suddenly stopped singing. He shut his mouth so fast his teeth actually clicked together.

"You're in a good mood this morning." Bobby said knowingly, chuckling again as Dean tried his best to look nonchalant. Like he hadn't just been singing and dancing to Led Zeppelin in the kitchen. God, he was becoming domesticated - all he was missing was a frilly apron and curlers.

"Sam came to see me in the workshop last night." he said, with a shrug that was meant to look casual. But he couldn't keep the smile off his face and turned back to the bacon grinning like a madman. "Bobby, that kid is amazing. He's actually got a handle on it. He's going to be okay."

"Sam's a special kid." Bobby agreed, leaning against the bench by the stove and taking a sip of his coffee. He watched Dean over the rim of the cup as he moved the bacon around, and was pleased to see that he looked… happy. Genuinely happy. It wasn't just that morning-after glow, either; that tension around his eyes was gone, and it was like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders. Now he knew Sam was really getting better, he could relax.

Knowing Dean was relaxed made Bobby relax too, because nobody knew Sam better than Dean. But, as the father-figure in this cobbled-together jigsaw puzzle of a family, there were a couple of questions he thought he ought to ask.

"Now, I'm going to ask this because I've gotta know how he's doing, but keep in mind I want one word answers. Zero details." he said, particular emphasis on that last part. "I was out when you boys came back into the house last night, and I don't want to know anything beyond the fact that Sam spent the night in your room." He looked at Dean meaningfully, making sure he was being understood.

"Okay." Dean fought back a laugh, pouring himself another cup of coffee.

"He was... okay?" Bobby asked, and Dean understood what he meant: 'He didn't freak out again?'

"Fine." Dean nodded, eyes sparkling. Sam had definitely had much more fun than the last time they'd tried it.

Bobby narrowed his eyes, trying not to think about what made Dean's eyes dance like that. "And you boys are going to continue this relationship of yours?"

"Uh-huh."

Bobby nodded briskly, pushing off the bench. "Good. You make him happy." he said, and with the father-figure moment over, he took his coffee over to the kitchen table and sat down in front of the paper. Dean cracked a couple of eggs into the frying pan, alongside the rapidly-crisping bacon, and just smiled. He was in such a good mood he didn't even mind the mushy chick-flick moment of a conversation.

Before Bobby got a chance to open his paper, the phone rang. Well, one of them, anyway - he got up from the table and answered the one labelled 'Singer Salvage'. From what Dean could gather from Bobby's end of the short conversation that followed, there was a woman stranded across town that needed a tow.

"I should be back in an hour. Don't burn the place down while I'm gone, okay?" Bobby grabbed his keys off the bench and headed for the back door, and Dean grinned.

"Just for that, I'm not saving you any bacon."

Bobby chuckled as he went out the door into the cold, grey day, and half a minute later Dean heard the big old tow truck roar to life. It was a faded red steel monster, the old kind with a rubberised sling hung from a boom thicker than Dean's arm and an ancient cast-iron diesel engine that was currently running a little rough. There was a grating noise of metal-on-metal as Bobby put it in gear, and the chains and steel cables hanging from the frame clanked and rattled as the rusted behemoth shuddered and lurched forward down the driveway, tyres crunching the icy gravel.

Dean shook his head and looked back down at the bacon and eggs, smiling to himself. That beast was sounding worse every time Bobby coaxed it to life, and he was definitely not going to be roped into helping with the inevitable (and rapidly approaching) repair job. Diesel engines were nasty, dirty, smelly things he liked to stay away from, and he had enough on his plate with the poor, neglected Impala.

The eggs had just reached that perfect just-set consistency when Dean heard Sam coming down the stairs. By the time he got into the kitchen they were on a plate with bacon and buttered toast, ready and waiting for him.

"Morning, sunshine." Dean grinned, putting the plate down on the table by a glass of orange juice. Sam sat gingerly down in the chair in front of it, smiling to himself, and Dean was pleased to see he looked good - better than he had in weeks. His eyes were bright and there were even cute little rosy patches high on his cheeks. He was glowing.

"Where's Bobby?" Sam asked, picking up a piece of bacon. It was golden brown and crispy, just the way he liked it, and made an audible crunch when he bit into it.

"Someone called for a tow." Dean said, cracking another couple of eggs into the frying pan.

"Did he hear…?" Sam asked shyly, around a mouthful of bacon.

"What, that I made you scream like a girl?" Dean turned around, coffee in hand, just in time to see Sam's cheeks flush an adorable pink. "No, he was out. But he knew as soon as he laid eyes on me this morning." he chuckled, taking a sip. Sam smiled, ducking his head and taking another bite of bacon.

Dean was just turning back to his eggs and about to reach for the salt shaker on the bench when he was interrupted by a truck pulling into the driveway. Tyres crunched on gravel, and then there was the clunk of a handbrake being pulled on.

"Huh. Bobby said he'd be at least an hour." Dean said to no-one in particular, shaking a sprinkling of salt over the bubbling eggs in the frying pan.

It took him a second to realise it didn't sound like Bobby's truck - no clanking chains, no noisy diesel engine or grinding gears. He frowned, parting the kitchen curtain slightly with a finger to look out the window.

"Oh fuck." he breathed. It wasn't Bobby's truck in the driveway.

"Dean, what-" Sam stopped himself mid-sentence as he realised the answer, and all the colour immediately drained from his face.

"You need to get out. Run." Dean hissed, still peering through the chink in the curtains. He didn't notice he did it, but he turned off the stove with his other hand.

Sam got out of his chair and started for the door, but stopped after a couple of steps and turned to look at Dean with wide, frightened eyes.

"What about you?" Sam was obviously terrified - he was visibly shaking - but at the same time he didn't want to leave his big brother there to face John's wrath alone.

Dean saw John climb out of the truck and start towards the steps, and his heart rate shot through the roof. "I'll be fine. Now get outta here!" he hissed, waving a hand at the door. Sam hesitated for another second, then turned and took off like a hare out through the living room.

Dean left the window and ran to the pantry, where he knew Bobby kept a loaded shotgun. He pulled a tin of flour out of the way and a white cloud puffed up around him when it clattered onto the floor. He reached up and pawed desperately at the shelf, searching.

He had to get that shotgun. If he was unarmed when John got inside…

Dean's hand closed around the cold steel barrel of the gun just as he heard the door open. He grabbed it and tried to backpedal, to put some space between him and his father, but he slipped in the flour and almost fell. By the time he'd caught his balance John was standing right beside him, pistol aimed squarely at his left temple.

Dean sighed and dropped his head, and handed John the gun stock-first before he even asked for it. He took it wordlessly and set it on the kitchen table behind him, keeping the gun on his eldest son the whole time.

"Morning, Dean." he said, his voice level and calm. His face was mostly covered by a short, bristly beard, but from what Dean could see he looked calm as well.

"Yeah, it was." Dean replied, just as levelly. He was outwardly cool, his poker face serving him well, but he was absolutely freaking out on the inside.

Dean couldn't believe John was standing right there in front of him. He didn't understand how this could have happened. He'd been tracking John the whole time, ever since they ran from Norfolk, trying to avoid exactly this situation. As far as he was concerned Papa Winchester was supposed to be all the way down in fucking Georgia…!

Well, his credit cards said he was there, anyway…

"You left that trail in Georgia deliberately." It was a statement, not a question - Dean knew without having to ask. John had set the trap, and like an idiot, he'd walked right into it.

"I knew you'd track me. It's what I taught you to do." John confirmed, a little smile touching his lips. He tossed a pair of handcuffs at Dean and they landed with a clatter at his feet. "You know the drill." he said.

Dean bent to pick them up and tried not to wince. He could Houdini out of a lot of handcuffs, but not these ones. They were a high-security, double-locking model from Smith & Wesson - a favourite of John's because all the usual escape tricks didn't work. Dean knew from experience that he wasn't going to be able to discreetly slip free. Or slip free at all, probably.

"How'd you know we were here?" he asked, reluctantly securing the bracelets shut around his wrists with a metallic and final-sounding snap. He was sure John was enjoying the irony, after Dean had made him do much the same thing in Norfolk.

"Buddy of mine saw my car driving around town. Stood to reason." John replied, as infuriatingly succinct and locked-down as ever. "I tried tracking your cards and phones. Got nothing." he added, almost sounding proud as he motioned towards the library with the barrel of the gun. He never let it stray too far from Dean: even handcuffed, he wasn't taking any chances.

"Burned them the first day we were here." Dean did as he was told and walked slowly through the double doors, hands clasped in front of him. He felt like a prisoner being escorted down Death Row.

"But you kept my car." There was an edge to John's voice now, and when Dean turned to face him he didn't look so serene anymore.

"My car. Title's in my name now." Dean pointed out. He couldn't help but smile, and John backhanded it right off his face. The blow hurt, but he managed to keep his feet and by some miracle he didn't taste blood when he stood back up to glare at his father, hand pressed against his throbbing jaw.

"So where's your brother, Dean?" John asked, his tone almost conversational again as he perched on the edge of Bobby's desk. He laid his gun on his right thigh, finger still by the trigger, and kept his eyes on Dean.

"I don't know. Haven't seen him all day." Dean replied, innocently, pretending like he wasn't lying his ass off and assessing his escape options (limited though they may be) at the same time.

He was standing in the middle of the room, multiple feet away from anything that could be shanghaied into service as a weapon - John would have plenty of time to place his shot if he tried anything. And it would only take one shot. John wasn't going to miss.

"Don't lie to me, Dean." John sighed wearily. He knew for a fact Dean had given Sam very clear instructions on where to hide out - again, because that was what he'd taught them to do. And as much as Dean hated to admit it, he was right.

After they'd come to Sioux Falls Dean had literally heard John's voice in his head: "If you have the time, search out the best hiding place you can find, so you have it if you ever need to use it." As soon as Sam had been able to, they'd walked the salvage yard and done just that. So, yeah, Dean knew exactly where his baby brother was - but wild horses couldn't drag it out of him.

"I don't know - really." Dean repeated. Outwardly, he looked so cool that butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. "Although, you've gotta know I wouldn't tell you if I did." he added, a touch of a smile playing on his lips. He couldn't help it - Dean's natural, ingrained response to terror was to smile in its face and sass it as much as possible.

John was on his feet in a flash, launching another backhander, and Dean was face-to-face with the carpet almost before he knew what was happening. John had hit harder this time, and when Dean climbed back to his feet there was a trickle of bright red blood running from the corner of his mouth.

"Why are you so hell-bent on protecting that little whore?"

"He's not a whore." Dean shot back, without missing a beat. He brought his hands up and wiped at his mouth with the back of his right hand, staring daggers at John. If looks could kill, he'd have been struck stone dead where he stood.

John's eyes sparkled as he sat back against the desk. He could see he'd hit a nerve. "So you're the only one he's fucking?" he asked, eyeing Dean speculatively.

"What did he do to make you hate him so much? He's only a kid." Dean tried not to let the anger show in his voice. He didn't want John to know he was getting to him.

"'He's only a kid'. Do you make a habit of screwing children...?"

Dean didn't dignify that with a response. He just glared, his mouth set in a hard line while John's turned up into an evil little smile.

"You say he's not a whore, but I've gotta tell you, he sure moaned like one when I bent him over back in Norfolk."

Dean clenched his fists and took a long, deep breath, fighting the urge to get up and slap the words right out of his father's mouth. He could see what John was doing, baiting him like this, but that didn't stop him wanting to strangle the man with his bare hands.

John leaned forward, focused intently on his eldest son. He could see he was making inroads. "What happened, Dean? How did he suck you in?" He paused for a second, just for effect. "How did your demon-blooded little brother convince you to start fucking him?"

"He sleeps with me because he wants to." Dean said finally, lips pulling back from his teeth in what could only loosely be called a smile. There was no warmth in it. "You had to break his arm."

John's response was a vicious, hard right hook to his jaw that made Dean see stars. He staggered back a couple of steps, but kept his feet. Just.

"It's because of Sam that your mother is dead. Mary would feel exactly the same way I do!" John punctuated that sentence with another punch that split Dean's lower lip.

The mention of Mary was too much for Dean. "Mom would never let you hurt Sam. Don't you dare bring her into this!" He snarled and went for John, trying to do whatever damage he could, handcuffs or no handcuffs. He managed to get in a couple of good kicks in to John's midsection and lower body, but with his hands restrained there was really no contest. John soon had him pinned against the wall, bleeding, with one big hand wrapped around his throat.

"You think she'd let you screw him?" John demanded, pushing Dean back and up against the wall so hard that started to cut off his breathing and circulation.

Dean wouldn't have replied, even if he could have gotten enough air to say the words. He didn't have an answer for that one.

"For God's sake, he's got demon blood in him, Dean!" John grimaced, like just saying the words made him feel sick. "He's probably not even human!"

"Don't care." Dean gasped, his voice barely more than a whisper. "No way in hell I'm telling you where he is, you psychotic sonofabitch!"

John let him down off the wall and hit him a few more times, shot after shot to the head and body until he was flat out on the library floor spitting blood onto Bobby's Persian rug. He had the beginning of a vicious headache, and everything was kind of fuzzy. He was no closer to telling John where Sam was, though - if anything, he was more determined not to.

John sat on his haunches a few feet away, wiping blood off his knuckles and studying his eldest son. "You're really not going to tell me, are you?" he sighed, sounding resigned. Evidently, he could see this course of action wasn't going to get him anywhere.

Dean shook his head, glaring defiantly at John. He could take beatings from his dad all day long - hell, he had. This wasn't even a bad one yet.

"Right. Well, if you're not smart enough to save yourself, let's see if your brother does any better." John grabbed Dean by the collar of his t-shirt and literally dragged him across the floor, out through the kitchen and onto the back porch. It was freezing out there, and the cold immediately bit through Dean's jeans and thin cotton t-shirt.

"I figure he's out cowering amongst the wrecks, and we've gotta make sure he can hear you." John continued, and hauled Dean to his feet.

He pulled a length of rope out of one pocket and tossed it up into the decorative lattice that encircled the top of Bobby's veranda. It was just a series of small arches between the wooden posts, with lengths of dowel running up to meet the veranda roof, but it was solid enough and at just the right height for John to tie Dean's handcuffs to - it kept his arms almost fully extended above his head.

As he looped the rope around the chain between the handcuffs, he got close enough that Dean could smell his breath - there wasn't even a trace of scotch on it, and the fact that John could do this sober sent an icy little shiver up Dean's spine that had nothing to do with the weather. The bats had obviously flown the belfry. There was something seriously broken in him, which begged a chilling little question: exactly how far was he willing to go to get his hands on Sam?

When he was done stringing up his eldest son John stood back, arms crossed over his chest, and admired his handiwork for a second. He looked pleased, and pulled a small Bowie knife out of a sheath attached to his belt - it was only about six inches long from hilt to tip, but it looked sharp.

"One last time. Where is he?" he asked, his breath condensing into a cloud of fog in front of him.

"Go to hell." There was venom in Dean's voice, but his eyes were fixed on that wickedly sharp little knife. He'd been expecting John to hit him some more, now that he was tied up like a heavy bag, but he was starting to feel a little more like a side of beef hanging in a butcher's shop.

"You'd better hope Sam crawls out of that hole he's hiding in when he hears you start screaming." John said, grabbing Dean's t-shirt at the collar and cutting it right down the front. He sawed at the dark cotton, leaving jagged, uneven edges, but the knife passed through like it wasn't even there and Dean couldn't help but shrink back from the blade.

"Isn't this where you're supposed to say 'this is going to hurt me more than it hurts you'?" he asked, his inner smartass coming to his defence again and trying to camouflage the rising panic. He knew John knew how to use that knife, and the cold was only going to make it worse…

"Oh, it's going to hurt you much more than it hurts me." John replied, smiling. Then he turned to the scrapyard, his eyes searching it for movement.

"You've got one chance, Sam!" he called, his voice carrying over the piles of rusted cars.

Dean knew Sam could hear him plain as day, and he also thought he knew what John was going to say next. He didn't think Sam would leave his hiding spot after only some verbal threats, but still...

"Don't you move, Sam!" Dean yelled, even louder. John turned around and punched him in the gut, knocking the wind out of him and making sure he'd stay quiet.

"Come out now and I won't have to hurt Dean." John continued, facing the yard again. "If you don't, I'm either going to cut your hiding place out of your brother or make him scream until you walk out of there yourself!"

John stood and watched the yard for a moment, his eyes searching the rusted hulks for any sign of Sam. Behind him, even as he struggled for breath, Dean was doing the same thing. He was reasonably sure that if Sam walked out of that salvage yard both Winchester boys were probably as good as dead. And it wouldn't be pretty.

When half a minute went by and there was no sign of movement, John sighed and turned back to Dean.

"He's tougher than you give him credit for." he rasped, a defiant little smile on his face.

"We'll see how tough he is when the screaming starts." John snorted derisively and held up the knife, inspecting the edge and giving Dean a chance to see the weak morning sun glinting off the blade.

He did his best to hold that poker face, but his stomach was twisting itself into knots. He knew the kinds of things John had done to monsters - sometimes in aid of the hunt, and sometimes because he thought they deserved it - and the fact that John was now looking at him as the enemy was a downright scary thought.

"Forgive me if I don't ease into it. Bobby isn't going to be returning as soon as he expects - I've made sure of that - but he won't be gone forever and I want to be done with this before he gets back." John could see the pulse at the base of Dean's throat running at a million miles an hour, and he smiled - a cold little one like Dean had seen that night in Norfolk. It scared the hell out of him that John could enjoy this.

"You sure you don't want to screw me first?" Dean asked, breathlessly. "Or am I too old for you?"

John just kept smiling at him, even as he put the knife to his son's skin. He watched Dean's face as he made the first cut, a relatively shallow one along a rib on his right side.

Dean bit down hard on his lower lip, holding his breath and trying not to scream. Then John pressed a little harder, dragging the tip of the knife along bone, and he couldn't help it anymore.

It wasn't that the screaming made it hurt any less - he just couldn't stay quiet. He hated to think what it must be like for Sam, curled up in his hiding spot, listening to his big brother screaming at the top of his lungs. Dean didn't think John could break him - not in the limited time he had - but the kid might not be able to take this horror show for even that long. Which was, of course, the point.

"Tell me where he is." John repeated, resting the tip of the knife on the next rib down.

"Go fuck yourself!" Dean gasped. John immediately pushed the blade through the smooth, tanned skin of Dean's side again, straight down to the rib below, and made sure to scrape it the entire length of the cut. He'd been sliced open before, by knives and claws and all sorts of sharp things, but that was a Penthouse pyjama party in Heaven compared to that knife scoring the surface of his bones. John knew it, too - that's exactly why he was doing it.

"You can stop this anytime you want. Just tell me where your brother is." John said gently, opening up the flesh over a third rib and drawing another howl of pain from his eldest son.

"Ha! So you can do this to him?" Dean tried to laugh, to show John he was still in control, but all he could manage was a dry cackle.

John leaned in close, stroking the fresh, unmarked skin of Dean's left side with the tip of the knife. "Just between you and me, that's not what I've got in mind for your little slut and that tight ass of his." he whispered, smiling.

Dean growled and tried to kick out at him, but John dug the tip of the knife into the bottom of his left pectoral muscle, pushing it in a good half an inch. Dean had no choice but to stop thrashing to avoid opening up a long, painful wound.

"I figure that table over there's just the right height." John pointed to an old wooden patio table about six feet away. "Don't worry, I'll make sure you can see his face while I tear into him."

"You know you're broken, right? That something snapped in your head?" Dean panted, and cried out when John suddenly twisted the knife still piercing his chest.

"I'm not the one fucking my little brother." he hissed, yanking the knife back out.

John kept cutting and didn't pause again until Dean had a set of matching bone-deep lacerations, three on each side, extending from the side of his ribcage and nearly meeting in the front. A thin sheet of blood ran from each one, covering Dean's abdomen like a red, steaming curtain and soaking into the hem of his jeans. He was breathing too heavily for them to clot properly, which had the added benefit of hurting like hell - every time Dean took a breath, it felt like his chest was on fire.

John stopped for a minute to let Dean enjoy this little slice of Hell, and turned back to yell into the salvage yard again. "Come on, Sam! I'll stop cutting Dean if you come out!"

Dean sucked in as much air as he could, even though the damage to his chest made it indescribably painful to expand his ribcage, and yelled as loud as he could.

"No! Stay away!" he shouted, his voice strained and hoarse after all the screaming.

He'd barely got the last word out when John punched him viciously in the face, opening up the cut on his bottom lip again. Dean immediately spat a mouthful of blood back at him, so John hit him again, hard enough to make him see stars.

Dean's legs went to jelly then, and his knees buckled under him. All his weight suddenly fell onto his wrists and the metal handcuffs bit cruelly into his flesh, but that was all background noise compared to the explosion of pain in his chest as his change in posture tore at the half-dozen wounds over his ribs.

The pain stole the breath from his lungs and he let out a strangled little gasp, struggling to get his legs under him again and take the pressure off his chest. Fresh blood welled up from the matching sets of wounds, which looked more like claw marks from a big cat than individual cuts from a knife.

John watched him, amused, and waited till he was standing before he pressed the tip of the knife against Dean's right side, almost as far right as he could go, just below where his liver would be. Dean felt the knife cut through the top layers of skin, and he suddenly got very still. The only movement in his body was his shallow, laboured breathing.

"It's going to start hurting now. Tell Sam to come out." John told him, quite seriously.

"Go f-" Dean began, but the sentence trailed off into a hoarse scream of agony as John pushed the knife in. He went quickly through the skin and about half an inch of muscle, then slowly and excruciatingly steadily pushed it in deeper.

Dean felt every millimetre, but it wasn't a sharp pain, exactly. Not like you'd expect. It was hot; more like being burned than stabbed in slow motion. John was pushing the cold blade slowly through muscle, all the way to the hilt, and Dean could feel the warm, wet blood running down his side and soaking his jeans. They were starting to stick to him now - dimly, in the back of his mind, he knew that probably wasn't a good sign.

When John had buried the entire length of the blade in Dean's side, so deep and so far to the right of his body that the tip was barely half an inch from pushing through his back, he paused. He looked at Dean, his face covered in blood and bruises and tears streaming down his cheeks, and Dean glared defiantly back at him.

"Just tell me what I want to know. Then this can stop." he said. He almost sounded sincere.

Dean fought the urge to roll his eyes. Even if he believed it - that John was going to stop once he had Sam - there was no way he was going to hand his baby brother over to this psychopath. Seeing what came next would be worse than anything John could do to him.

"Come on, Dean!" John was starting to get impatient.

When Dean still didn't answer John gripped the handle of the knife, now slippery with Dean's blood, and twisted it. He didn't twist it especially far, or even very hard - he didn't need to. Dean screamed and swore at John, and tried to kick out at him, but all that movement only made it hurt more.

"Oh, I'm gonna fucking kill you!" Dean growled, panting through the pain, but John just smiled.

"Yeah. 'Course you are." He drew the knife out agonisingly slowly and lined it up over a new spot, about an inch below the first. "You better get on with it. You're bleeding pretty bad here, son." He used the blade of the knife to scrape away the blood on the new site he'd just picked, then pressed the tip into the skin.

Dean grunted and held his breath, staring into the space over John's right shoulder and willing himself to stay quiet. John watched his face, taking it in.

The knife was just passing through into his abdominal muscles when Dean saw a flash of movement in the yard, just catching it in his peripheral vision. He focused on it before he could stop himself, and his heart sank.

John saw him do it and smiled triumphantly as he turned around. Sam was standing on the edge of the yard, looking over at them. He looked very small against all the old rusted hulks behind him.

Dean tried to scream at Sam to forget him and run, but his throat was raw and he was struggling to get enough air, and he couldn't form the words. He had to watch Sam walk across the open ground towards his rapist.

He went slowly, taking small, shuffling steps through the long grass and then onto the gravel driveway - every instinct was obviously screaming at him to turn and run, but he didn't. He kept coming, because he didn't want John to hurt Dean any more.

"Thanks, Dean. Couldn't have done it without you." John gave him a good-natured pat on the cheek, enjoying the horrified expression on his face. He smiled and left Dean hanging on the porch to go towards Sam, wiping the little Bowie knife on his sleeve before he slid it back into its sheath.

Dean swore and immediately started yanking on his cuffs with renewed vigour, trying desperately to get free. He was ignoring the firestorm that had engulfed his chest, and the waterfall of fresh blood running down over his stomach. He could see John's pistol, sitting just out of reach on the nearby table next to the handcuff keys. If he could only get loose…

John walked right up to Sam and backhanded him across the face so hard he almost fell. Dean heard the slap, then Sam's yelp of pain. He didn't feel the cuffs cutting into his abused wrists, or the blood as it trickled down his arms. His eyes were fixed on John as he hit Sam again, knocking him down onto the driveway. He stood over Sam as he held a shaking hand to his bleeding lip, and laughed. Laughed.

Grunting with effort, Dean heard a crack. He pulled down again, and almost hit himself in the head with his own hands as he broke the old, dry wood. He took a few stumbling steps towards the table, reaching out with trembling hands slick with his own blood, and his fingers closed around John's matte black semi-automatic.

When John turned around, he had a handful of Sam's hair and was ready to drag him kicking and screaming up to the house. The evil smile on his face melted away when he instead came face-to-face with the barrel of his own gun, aimed right between his eyes, held in the bloody and slightly shaky hands of his eldest son.

There were no last words. No wisecracks from Dean, no threats from John. There wasn't time. As soon as he had the shot, Dean took it. He squeezed the trigger, the gun barked once, and John was dead before he hit the ground.

Sam heard the thump on the driveway beside him, but sat there trembling on his knees in the cold gravel, taking short little gasping breaths and staring past Dean into empty space. There was a warm, wet feeling on the side of his face, and when he wiped at it with his hand it came away red.

Dean let the gun fall from his nerveless hands and reached out to Sam, pulling him to his feet with a grunt of pain.

"'d he hurt you baby?" he rasped, tilting Sam's face up as his eyes searched for damage. He had trouble focusing, but he thought Sam looked all right - a couple of bruises, and a little blood from one lip, but okay. Dean sighed, relieved, and then his knees buckled under him and everything went black.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

When he came to, Dean was laid out on the couch in Bobby's library. It was still light outside, but the shadows were wrong, and it took him a second to work out that was because it was now late afternoon. Which meant he'd been out for most of the day.

He blinked, looking down at himself. He was covered in the old blanket Bobby usually left draped over the back of the couch, which was a good thing, because he could feel he was only wearing his boxer shorts.

Dean pushed the blanket back a little, grimacing as the movement pulled at the wounds all over his chest. His torso was wrapped in bright white bandages from his pecs down to his navel, hiding the dozens of stitches that closed the wounds over his ribs and the deep puncture under his left pectoral muscle. The two stab wounds in his right flank were similarly stitched, but covered in sticky white dressings.

He'd expected all of that, but was somewhat surprised to see the fresh white cast on his left arm, extending down from his elbow over his hand. When he tore free of the veranda to go to Sam, he figured that crack was the wood giving way. Apparently the decorative woodwork wasn't all he broke.

Satisfied he was all still there, Dean looked over at Sam - he was curled up beside the couch in a lounge chair, sound asleep. His top lip was split and swollen, and there was a nasty purple bruise over his right cheekbone. John really liked hurting the kid, and Dean shuddered to think what he would've done if he'd had more than a minute alone with him.

He stirred as Dean watched, and opened his eyes a little as he stretched. When he saw Dean was awake, his eyes flew all the way open and he immediately sat up.

"Hey sunshine." Dean croaked, trying to smile. Even that hurt, and when he reached up with his right hand and felt his split lower lip and the nasty cut over his left cheekbone, he wasn't surprised.

"Stop talking, Dean." Sam told him, retrieving a glass of water with a straw from the desk nearby. Dean accepted it gratefully and took a few short sips - his throat felt like sandpaper, and the water was heaven.

"So how do I look?" he asked Sam, trying to smile a little. Sam didn't smile back.

"That bad, huh?" Dean winced as he set the glass down on the table by the arm of the couch. "So Ellie patched me up?" he guessed, and Sam nodded.

"Am I going to live…?"

Sam almost smiled at that. Almost.

Dean gave up trying to cheer him up and just wordlessly held out his arms. Sam immediately sank onto the couch beside him and cuddled up, pressing his body as close to Dean's as he dared and looping an arm around his big brother's lower back.

"You okay? Did he hurt you?" Dean hugged him as tight as his injuries would allow, and Sam rested his head on the warm, bare skin of Dean's chest.

"Not really." Sam replied, and Dean furrowed his brow a little.

"He didn't really hurt you, or you're not really okay?"

"I dunno… both, I guess." Sam shrugged a shoulder. "If I'd come out earlier, maybe…" He trailed off, sniffing a little, and Dean felt warm, wet tears on the skin of his bare chest.

"This isn't your fault." Dean told him, immediately. "It's got nothing to do with us. Anything he did to you or to me is totally on him and his own, personal crazy." He stroked his uninjured right hand back through Sam's hair, and placed a kiss on his temple.

"I heard you screaming, and I saw what he did to you." Sam whispered, and Dean grimaced. The poor kid was probably going to have nightmares about that. As if his subconscious didn't have enough fuel already.

"I didn't care what he did to me, as long as he didn't get near you. It was worth it, okay? You were worth it."

"You shot him." Sam said, so quietly Dean could barely hear him.

"I'm…" Dean started, but the words caught in his throat. He closed his eyes, but all he saw was John, and the look of surprise on his face, and then red. Red everywhere. On his hands, all over Sam… everywhere.

"I'm sorry you saw that." Dean whispered back.

He wasn't sorry the bastard was dead - John had forced his hand. He had no other choice. But that didn't mean it didn't make him sick to his stomach to know he'd made orphans of them both, and that Sam had seen him do it.

The worst thing was, he couldn't hate John. He'd done some evil things, but he was their father. He was good to them a lot of the time, and he taught them everything they knew. It would have been easier if he could hate the man. Maybe then it wouldn't hurt so Goddamn much.

"You saved me." Sam said, very softly, bringing Dean back to the real world. He tilted his head back to look up at Dean, his big hazel eyes shining with tears.

"No, Sammy. You saved me." Dean gave him a very small smile. "That was a stupid fucking thing to do, by the way." he added, and Sam finally smiled too.

"You should've left me. He was going to kill you." Dean told him, more seriously. That wasn't all he was going to do, but Sam didn't need to think about that.

"I know. But you wouldn't have left me."

Dean didn't reply. He couldn't deny that.

"Thank you." Sam added, and a wry little smile flashed across Dean's face. Sam was thanking him for killing their father.

They were quiet for a while after that, Dean just holding Sam and being grateful both of them were still there to do it. Eventually Bobby came to check up on him and sat with them.

"You okay, son?" Bobby asked, even though he didn't see how Dean could possibly be okay after what had happened to him today.

Dean twitched one shoulder in a shrug, but stayed quiet. He wasn't okay - not by a long shot. Sam felt him tense and hugged a little tighter, and Dean unconsciously buried a hand in his hair, stroking the soft, glossy locks.

"I'm sorry I wasn't here for you boys." Bobby told them, heaving a sigh. "I can't believe I fell for a prank call like that!" he growled at himself, pulling off his hat and running a hand back over his hair.

"It's okay. It was our fight, anyway." Dean said. It wasn't like it would've been better if Bobby had been there when John turned up - the crafty old bastard probably would've just shot him on sight and gone on with his plan.

"No son should ever have to shoot his father, Dean." Bobby told him, gently.

"The sonofabitch didn't give me a lot of choice." Dean felt tears stinging his eyes. He blinked a few times and looked away, shutting his mouth before the emotion could show in his voice. John had literally carved the flesh from his bones, but Dean wasn't a psychopath - he couldn't shoot the man and not feel it. No matter how much he might like that right now.

"You did the right thing, there's no doubt about that. There's only one way to deal with a rabid dog." Bobby said, and the confidence in his voice made Dean feel a little better. He knew all that already, really, but it was just nice to hear someone else say it out loud.

"So what are we going to do with…?" Dean started, but trailed off. He couldn't quite bring himself to ask the question: What are we going to do with the body?

Bobby nodded grimly. "Already taken care of. Big old pyre built out the back, just waiting for a fire." He didn't say it out loud, but they didn't want anything taking over the corpse and coming back for another shot. Plain old vanilla-mortal John was bad enough.

"So let's light it." Dean told him immediately, and Bobby looked taken aback.

"Now? Don't you want to rest a bit first?"

"No. I wanna finish it." Dean started to push himself up into a sitting position, and Sam immediately got up to help him. He got his older brother into some clean jeans and a button-up flannel shirt - there was no way Dean could lift his arms over his head to get into a t-shirt - and then walked with him out to the back of the salvage yard. In a clearing among rusted wrecks something wrapped in those damn yellow floral sheets sat atop a roughly-stacked pile of old, dry wood.

"The sheets are a nice touch." Dean said drily, standing there with an arm around Sam's shoulders and one of Sam's around his lower back. The kid was basically holding him up.

"We should feel sad about this, shouldn't we?" Sam asked, uncertainly. Here they were, about to burn their recently-deceased father's body, and he felt… well, relieved, more than anything. He was pretty sure that wasn't normal.

Dean sighed, considering what he could possibly say to answer that without damaging the kid irrevocably. He watched as Bobby came into the clearing with a beaten up old olive-drab jerry can and began to pour the contents over the pyre, and the smell of gasoline drifted over on the breeze.

"I'll miss the good stuff. He wasn't all bad, and it's sad that we lost that, but…" Dean scrunched up his nose as he searched for the right words. "The guy up there in those sheets isn't Dad, Sam. That guy I… he wasn't capable of the good stuff anymore, you know?"

"We lost Dad a while ago, didn't we?" Sam sighed, and Dean squeezed his shoulders.

"Yeah, sunshine. We did."

When Bobby had emptied out the jerry can, he came over to the Winchester boys and set the empty fuel container safely out of reach of the imminent inferno. There was a little gas-powered blowtorch in his hand.

"You boys want to do it?" he asked.

Sam immediately shook his head, but Dean held out his hand. It was only right for a Winchester to set the fire.

Bobby gave the torch to him without a word, and Dean steeled himself and shambled the ten feet over to the corner of the pyre. Sam hung back, watching - he couldn't quite bring himself to go any closer.

Dean hit the 'ignite' button on the blowtorch when he got close, but hesitated for a second to look up at the tightly wrapped bundle at the top. He thought he could understand why people wrapped their dead in shrouds or put them in caskets before they burned them. John might have been a homicidal monster at the end, but Dean just couldn't hate him and it was still hard to light the fuse on this anonymous bundle of sheets, knowing what they were concealing.

He winced as he bent down a little to hold the hissing blue flame of the blowtorch to the fuel-soaked wood. The gasoline fumes caught instantly and the pyre went up like a Roman candle; flames raced over it with a whoosh and an explosion of heat that drove him all the way back to Sam and Bobby on the edge of the clearing.

Sam immediately looped that arm around his waist again, steadying him, and Dean leaned on him with a grunt of pain as the fire bathed all the rusty hulks in red-gold light the same colour as the sunset. The Winchester boys stood there in silence with Bobby and just watched it burn, Dean's arm around Sam's shoulders as he hugged his older brother.

Bobby stood off to the side, staring thoughtfully into the flames and giving the boys a little space. He didn't have nearly as many issues with Papa Winchester as his sons had, but John had been a friend once, and it still hurt the older hunter to know it was him up there on that pyre. One more that died bloody.

"We're safe." Sam whispered, eventually. The fire reflected off the tear tracks that ran down his cheeks, but he wasn't sad. For the first time in God-knows how long he felt really, genuinely safe. He was never going to have to come home to a drunk and violent father who made his life miserable because of things he had no control over, or watch his big brother take the beating for him.

"He can't hurt you anymore." Dean confirmed, giving him a little squeeze. For him, knowing John was never going to turn up on their doorstep again was like a physical weight had been lifted off his shoulders.

"He can't hurt us anymore." Sam corrected him. He turned to look up at Dean, and was relieved to see a couple of tear tracks on his big brother's cheeks.

"That's the same thing, Sammy." Dean smiled, just a little. Sam sniffed, wiping at his eyes with his sleeve, but he was smiling too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I like torturing Sam and Dean. Can you tell…? (In my defence, I did give them something back. The sex seemed like fun, didn't it? :p)
> 
> This BB made me very happy. I hope this little slice of Sam and Dean's own personal Hell made you happy as well. ;) Review and let me know! (And check out the rest of this BB on LJ!)


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